


Right Here Waiting

by ideliagirl



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Cersei's three kids aren't Jaime's, F/M, Gods yes, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, May/December Relationship, Mentions of Child/Sexual Abuse and Violence, Mentions of miscarriage, No Cersei/Jaime Incest, Noble Familes of Westeros are instead big businesses, Secret Relationship, Smut, Trying to fight the inevitable, definitely smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-22
Updated: 2017-11-03
Packaged: 2019-01-21 06:05:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 41,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12451149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ideliagirl/pseuds/ideliagirl
Summary: Sansa Stark shouldn't be attracted to Jaime Lannister. Jaime Lannister shouldn't feel drawn to Sansa Stark.Their two different worlds should only brush every once and a while. A friendly handshake. A "Hey, how are things going with you?"But that never seems to be what happens. And sooner or later, they'll have to deal with it.





	1. Oh, Can't You See It, Baby? You Got Me Going Crazy.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm an avid Jonsa shipper (I will go down with this ship). But that doesn't seem to be what TPTB are going to give us, so I started thinking about other pairings. And this idea grabbed ahold of my brain and wouldn't let go. Hope you enjoy!
> 
> No Cersei/Jaime incest. Her three kids are Robert's (or some other guy she was having an affair with).

“Sansa? Sansa?”

Sansa awoke to the feel of a finger poking her shoulder and she lifted her head off her desk to find Myrcella Baratheon with her arms crossed and her hip jutted out, looking down at her disapprovingly. “Did you sleep last night?”

“That depends.” Sansa croaked out, her voice rough from disuse, as she swept back her unkempt hair and looked around her messy room. “Is it nighttime or daytime?”

“It’s 5pm.”

“Good.” She shook out her limbs and put her fingertips back on her keyboard. “I’ve only been asleep for an hour and I can get back to my paper.”

“Have you at least eaten?”

“You _saw_ me eat.” Sansa shrugged. “I came into the kitchen when you and Trystane were debating between Naath or Lys for summer break. I ate Pop-Tarts.”

“Sansa, gods! That was last night.” Myrcella picked up an empty coffee mug from Sansa’s desk and turned it upside down. “I’m not letting you have any more of this!”

“Hey!” Sansa reached for the mug, groaning before looking down to the purple yoga pants and black tank top she’d been wearing for the last three days. “You’re just a sophomore! You’ll know the hellishness of senior projects when it’s your turn, and if there’s a girl like you is around, you’ll regret giving me a hard time.”

“No,” Myrcella shouted from the hallway, coming back into Sansa’s room with a laundry basket and picking up clothes from her floor and bed. “When I’m going through the hellishness of senior projects, if there’s a girl like me around, I’ll feel very lucky to have the help of someone who refuses to let me crumble under the stress of it.”

“Luck doesn’t get you top grades on final projects.” Sansa smirked, gesturing over to her shared bathroom. “Despite what you might believe by looking at Margaery’s academic career.”

“Go take a shower. Your hair is all greasy and you smell.” Myrcella put her arms under Sansa’s armpits and bodily lifted her out of her chair. “My uncle is taking Trystane and I out to dinner and you’re coming with.”

“No, I don’t have time—”

“You can’t survive on coffee and Pop-Tarts! And food and fresh air will reinvigorate you!” She pointed to the bathroom door. “Go! I’m not taking no for an answer!”

Sansa knew she’d only be able to get back to her project in peace if she went along for the evening. Myrcella Baratheon could dig her heels in like nobody’s business. And the only response she could give to her roommate’s demands were the loud growls of her empty stomach.

“Fine.” Sansa stomped off to her bathroom and slammed the door, before opening it again and yelling out. “But I’m ordering dessert!”

 

Sansa gave herself one last look-over in the mirror before grabbing her purse and walking out of her bedroom, bellowing down the hall before her, “I don’t care how fancy this place is—you make me get out of my yoga pants, the most you’ll get me in is my jeans! No matter how bad I look.”

She came into the living room of the apartment to find a exceedingly handsome man with short dirty-blond hair, a chiseled jaw full of scruff and shining green eyes, sitting with his legs crossed on their sofa. His jacket was thrown over his arm, showing off his defined chest and arm muscles through a crisp, tailored shirt.

“Jeans are fine.” He stared at her reverently, his mouth slightly open. “Though, I can’t imagine you’d look bad even if you wore a burlap sack.”

She stepped back slightly in the direction of her room. “Um, thanks.”

“I finally get to meet you, the elusive fourth roommate.” He stood from the sofa and gave her a dazzling smile. “I was beginning to think you were a figment of ‘Cella’s imagination.”

She narrowed her eyes, but smiled back at him. “You’re not Tyrion.”

“They did all say you were the smart one.” He winked at her and chuckled. “I met the doe-eyed one—”

“Margaery.”

“And the silver-haired one—"

“Daenerys.”

“—at Myrcella’s 20th birthday party.” He finished, his thumb pointing down the other hall toward Myrcella’s room. “But I didn’t get to meet you.”

Sansa held out her hand. “Sansa Stark.”

“Right, Ned Stark’s daughter.” He took her hand and shook it. “Jaime Lannister.”

“I gathered.” Sansa laughed softly. “Myrcella said her uncle was taking us to dinner, I just assumed it was Tyrion.”

“It’s fine.” He laughed in return. “Usually, it _has_ been Tyrion the last few years, but with me getting back into the country a few months ago, I guess I’ve been spoiling her with attention, trying to make up for lost time.”

“That’s right! You’d been living in Essos with the Royal Guard.”

“Only got back this winter, fortunately just in time for ‘Cella’s birthday.” He playfully ducked his head toward her. “Unfortunately, just in time to miss you leaving for Braavos.”

“Semester abroad.” Sansa grinned widely, her body flooding with a slow heat at this man standing so close to her. “We were playing continent tag.”

He laughed genuinely, then spent several long moments looking deeply and appreciatively into her eyes. She began to fidget.

“I’m sorry,” he cleared his throat loudly. “I didn’t mean…..you don’t really look like the Starks that I know. Your, um, your hair.” He coughed behind a closed fist. “And your eyes.”

“Oh, yeah.” She ran a few fingers through her hair, her heart beating rapidly. “My mom. I take after my mom’s side.”

“Alright,” Myrcella walked into the living room putting on lipstick, completely unaware of the tension between the two. “Sansa wants dessert and so do I, so I think _fantastic desserts_ should be the determining factor of which restaurant we choose tonight.”

Sansa tore her eyes from Jaime to look at Myrcella, her skin flushing. “Dessert, absolutely.”

“Sansa, you okay?” Myrcella asked, concern marring her features before she looked at her uncle. “Uncle Jaime, you haven’t been teasing Sansa mercilessly like you did Margaery and Daenerys, have you?!” She began putting her things in her purse and took her jacket off the hook by the front door. “I swear! Sansa, my whole birthday party, Uncle Jaime couldn’t stop himself from teasing us like we were pre-schoolers.”

Jaime took the last jacket off the hook and held it open for Sansa. “No,” he cleared his throat again as she slipped her arms through. “definitely haven’t been doing that.”

 

Two hours later, Sansa sat in the passenger seat of Jaime’s luxury car, anxiously tapping her fingertips against her thigh. From time to time, Sansa would catch Jaime looking over at her and they’d nod at each other, sharing the same tight smile.

She hadn’t been imagining that heat between them in her living room, nor the electricity that flowed as they’d sat pressed side by side in their booth at the restaurant. Every time their arms touched—or gods forbid _their legs_ —it was as if a lightning bolt shot across the small space that separated them.

Their fingertips brushed once when they’d both reached for the salt at the same time, and she had almost passed out from the yearning that touch sent rolling through her veins. Glancing over at him, he’d looked as dazed as her, like someone had struck him over the head with the wine bottle.

Myrcella and Trystane groping each other across the table from them certainly didn’t help—neither did the two of them ducking out before the end of the meal.

“I’m sorry you got wrangled into driving me home because Myrcella slinked off to Trystane’s place.”

Jaime waved a dismissive hand. “It’s fine. And I’m sorry about the inappropriateness of………”

“Myrcella trying to stick her tongue down Trystane’s throat right at the table?” Sansa concluded for him.

“Yeah, that.” He nodded firmly, running a hand through his hair. “She shouldn’t be doing that in front of her roommate.”

“And she _should_ be doing it in front of her relative?” Sansa chuckled.

“Well, no.” Jaime chuckled weirdly in return. “But I’ve never spent time with her and Trystane without Tommen being there with us.”

“I’ve never seen her do it in front of Tommen, either.” Sansa paused, reluctantly admitting. “But they also don’t do that in front of Tyrion. So……..”

He clutched his chest in mock-outrage. “So……you’re saying she had no problem publicly dry-humping her boyfriend since she was out with the black-sheep of her family?”

“You think _you’re_ the black-sheep of her family?” Sansa asked in disbelief, blanching at his description of himself.

“Well, I know by my father and Cersei’s prejudiced way of thinking, it would be Tyrion who’s the black sheep, but I’ve never subscribed to the way they—”

“No,” Sansa interrupted, shaking her head. “I just meant that along with Tommen and Tyrion, you’re the only ones in her family Myrcella gives a damn about, the only ones she loves. Not her rich grandpa or her well-connected parents—or the older brother who her rich grandpa and well-connected parents try to convince everyone is the Prince Who Was Promised—just you three.” The significance of Sansa’s claim hung heavy between them. “And if you’re lumped into the same group with Tommen and Tyrion? That makes you the furthest thing from the black sheep, at least in my book.”

He smiled to himself before turning the smile to her. “And just where do you fall in your family dynamic?”

“Me?” She smirked back at him. “I’m the good girl.”

He let out a small, aroused whimper at the picture painted by her statement. “The um, the good girl?”

“Yeah, I’m the good—” she saw the lust written on his face and sat up straighter in her seat. “I don’t….I don’t do things that would cause my family to be disappointed in me.”

He drummed his thumbs against the steering wheel. “Right.”

“Right.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

“I uh, I met your brother, a couple months back.” Jaime began hesitantly, trying to move away from their previous subject. “He was representing the Stark Corporation at the Twins Telecom relaunch in the Riverlands.”

“Oh.” She said, not knowing what else to say.

Jaime cocked his head to the side. “I don’t think he liked me very much.”

“I bet that’s not true.” She tried to assure him. “You probably just caught the brunt of Robb not liking the Freys.”

“Well, nobody likes the Freys.” Jaime chuckled loudly. “It’s why old Walder has to ‘ _relaunch_ ’ his business every three years. Because he eventually screws over the friends he screwed over his last friends to ally with, and then thinks no one will be the wiser if he makes it seem like a whole new company.”

“Robb also hates Joffrey with a blinding passion because of how Joffrey treated me while we were dating.” She continued thoughtfully. “So, Robb may dislike you by association a little bit in that regard.”

Jaime looked ahead uncomfortably and cradled his forehead in his hand. “Oh, yeah. I forgot you dated Joffrey.”

“Um, yeah. A real long time ago, and only for a very short time.” Sansa replied softly, catching his discomfort. “It’s just that Robb is your stereotypical protective big brother and Joffrey—”

“—Is an abominable cunt?”

Sansa nearly choked on her own tongue. “Um, that’s……Well, those are actually the exact two words I call him in my head.”

“Well, then,” Jaime shrugged good-naturedly. “great minds think alike.”

Sansa truly laughed for the first time since getting back into Jaime’s car. “Yes, we do.”

“My sister and Robert are both abominable cunts too—along with my father.” Jaime shook his head in disapproval. “And if Joffrey ever had a chance of _not_ being one, that chance suffocated under the weight of his horrible actions for which his parents and grandfather never make him take responsibility.”

“ _Myrcella and Tommen_ aren’t like Joffrey.”

“No, they aren’t.” Jaime smiled sincerely, thinking of his two favorite people. “Cersei gave too much—or all—of her attention to Joffrey. Luckily for Myrcella and Tommen, that meant she never sunk her claws into them.”

“You don’t think highly of your sister.” It was a statement, not a question.

He turned to Sansa. “Do _you_?”

“No.” Sansa scoffed, shaking her head. “I don’t.”

“Cersei doesn’t love people. She lays claim to them.” Jaime said matter-of-factly. “And her loved one’s happiness is only important to her in how it extends to herself. She’ll shout from the rooftops how fiercely she loves her family, but it’s always about _her love_. And then that love really only means she thinks she owns you. She views anyone else playing with her toys as a major affront, for which she’ll do vile things to ‘ _protect what’s hers’_.”

“And that doesn’t make you angry?”

“Why would that make me angry?” He asked calmly, pausing at her raised brow and then going on to clarify. “It stopped making me angry a long time ago. I’d have to care about Cersei or what she thinks for it to make me angry—at least when it comes to _my_ life. Tyrion and I can still get quite angry if she upsets Myrcella and Tommen’s life, but they’ll both be adults soon and they’ve hopefully learned from their uncles to be just as indifferent to Cersei’s poison as we are.”

“It still amazes me that two people as sweet as Myrcella and Tommen came from Cersei.” Sansa eyes twinkled fondly.

Jaime’s grin was honest and proud. “No, those two came from the angels.”

“Actually, Myrcella told me that growing up…….” Sansa placed a soft hand on his arm. “she learned the most about how to be a good person from you.”

He looked to her hand resting on his forearm, his jaw clenching and the fingers of that arm gripping tighter around the steering wheel. “I can safely say I’m not an angel.”

She removed her hand as if she’d been burned. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“You think I’m upset because I _don’t_ want you to touch me?” He chuckled darkly as the car stopped at a traffic light. “Oh, how truly wrong you are, Sansa Stark.”

“Well, I’m amazed that was the first time I touched you.” Sansa admitted honestly, looking to the hand now in her lap. “Especially considering how many times I’ve _wanted to_ since we left the restaurant.”

“And I’ve wanted to touch you just as many times.” He confessed, his eyes nearly black with want as he looked her over from head to toe. “But in the three seconds your hand was on my arm, my mind was able to flip through a thousand different scenarios of us touching—and while the middles were quite enjoyable—all of the endings were bad.” He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. “I don’t think I could stand it if you got a bad ending because of me, Sansa. And so, I’m upset with myself.”

She turned in the seat so her body faced him fully. “You’re upset with yourself for a thousand different bad endings that you _won’t even_ _let us have_?”

His head dropped back to his headrest in defeat. “No. I’m upset because despite seeing all the thousand bad endings we could have if we touched—I want to touch you anyway.”

Disappointment hung in the air as Sansa sighed and again faced forward. “The light’s green.”

Jaime pressed on the gas and not another word was spoken the rest of the ride.

 

Five minutes later they pulled in front of her building.

Sansa exhaled slowly and unhooked her seatbelt. “Thanks for the free dinner.”

“Sansa.” Her name was almost inaudible as he licked his lips.

“Tyrion’s the clever uncle, Jaime.” Sansa chuckled darkly, gripping the door handle. “Maybe you just shouldn’t speak.”

Jaime unhooked his seatbelt and leaned across the center console, his face mere centimeters from hers. She could feel his breath on her cheek as his hand moved over her body toward her hip.

But instead of pulling her to him and pressing his lips against hers, Jaime slipped his hand into her purse. Pulling out her phone, he scrolled down and his thumbs tapped across the screen.

Finishing, he pressed the phone into her hand. “My number.”

“Why would you give me your number?” Sansa rasped in shock, her throat and lips instantly dry.

So close to him, she could see Jaime’s throat bob as he gulped audibly. “I don’t really have a good answer for that.”  


 

 

 

Myrcella looked truly and deliriously happy as she stood in her white gown with her arm hooked through Trystane’s at the head of the receiving line.

Blessedly, the wedding party photos were done, and with the last of them, Sansa had given herself permission to have fun for the first time in two days.

It had been a year since she’d seen Jaime Lannister. And she came into the weekend prepared to do whatever she must to avoid any awkward moments with him. She had been given a minor reprieve when Tyrion had mentioned last night at the rehearsal dinner that Jaime had flown to Essos unexpectedly and would only return just hours before the ceremony.

_Maybe he’ll be too tired from jet-lag to engage in the strange little dance we danced last time._

“I thought bridesmaid’s dresses were supposed to be tacky, so the bride looks more beautiful at the expense of making the bridesmaids look ugly?” The deep timbre of Jaime’s voice made her insides shiver from where he stood directly behind her.

And just like that, her hopes for an innocent encounter between them floated away like a balloon.

Sansa looked up from her small bouquet of orchids and saffron to turn around and face him. He stood before her looking ridiculously attractive in his tailored tuxedo. She nervously brought a hand up to her styled hair and rubbed her thighs together to try to stave off her arousal. She didn’t want to be walking around in the splendor of Myrcella’s wedding reception for the rest of the night with thoroughly soaked panties.

He leaned toward her. “Though, once again, I can’t imagine you’d look bad even in a burlap sack.”

“Well,” she bit her lip, shy at being back in his presence. “Myrcella’s too sweet to pick out ugly bridesmaid’s dresses just so she’d look more beautiful. And Cersei, well….Cersei’s just—”

“—too vain to let anything tacky be associated with _Cersei’s_ big day?” He finished her thought for her.

Sansa smiled softly. “How are you, Jaime?”

It took him a moment to speak, enraptured by her smile, before he finally shook out of his trance. “Uh, good. I’m good.” He smiled back at her. “I heard you graduated.”

“I did.” She nodded. “Though, I’m not actually out of school yet. Taking classes toward my Master’s in writing.”

“Oh yeah, you wanna be a writer!” He remembered, gesturing to her. “Myrcella’s been so busy with moving in with Trystane and then planning the wedding, I’ve barely seen or heard anything of _her_ , let alone any of her old college roommates.”

“And I know how devastated you must be,” she teased. “to no longer get regular updates on Margaery and Daenerys.”

“Who?” He winked at her. “Oh yeah, the doe-eyed one and the silver-haired one.”

She laughed enough to double over slightly. “I forget what it is that you call me.”

The mirth he’d been joining her in stopped instantly, instead moving to a dark, open expression and measured blinking of his deep eyes. “The one who’s too good for me.”

Her face fell out of amusement, her frozen body only moving when her lungs finally took in a shuddered breath. “Jaime……..I don’t think we should be saying these things to each oth—”

“There you are!” A voice called out from beside them.

Sansa watched numbly as a dark-haired, caramel-skinned beauty draped in a flowing, burgundy-colored designer gown that probably cost more than the combined rent of her apartment, came to stand next to Jaime and handed him a champagne glass. “I know you wanted whiskey, but you’re drinking lighter than that for the rest of the night. You should make it to the end of your niece’s wedding at least soberer than her father will manage.”

The woman stood smiling at Sansa for several long moments before Jaime cleared his throat and finally spoke hoarsely. “Arianne, this is Sansa Stark. One of Myrcella’s best friends.” He looked to Sansa remorsefully. “Sansa, this is Arianne Martell. Trystane’s older sister……..and my girlfriend.”

“Oh.” Sansa sort of yelped—her trepidation bleeding out before she shook it off and her manners took over—extending a hand. “It’s very nice to meet you.”

“And you.” Arianne smiled genuinely, shaking the hand offered. “Any friend of Myrcella’s is a friend of mine. She’s such a sweet girl, and I know she chooses her friends the same.”

_Fucking hell. I might actually like this woman._

“I’m so glad I actually got to be here. Business dealings got so tied up in Asshai that I missed the last flight out and was afraid I’d miss my own brother’s wedding.” Arianne smoothed her hand down Jaime white dress shirt. “But wouldn’t you know, I get a knock on my hotel room door yesterday and find that Jaime had commandeered Casterly Enterprises private jet to surprise me and bring me home.”

_Or I might not._

Jaime looked down to his shoes and then back up to give Arianne a pained smile, pointedly not daring to meet Sansa’s eyes.

Sansa gestured behind herself. “Um, if you’ll excuse me, I just need—"

“Babe! Babe!” Harry’s voice rang out and Sansa shut her eyes in defeat as he ran up next to her, grabbing her waist. “It was SO awesome, Edric just had gin and tonic shoot out of his nostrils!”

“Damn.” Sansa mumbled mockingly, looking back down to her bouquet in humiliation. “And I missed it.”

If Arianne Martell was unfortunately everything Sansa wasn’t—age appropriate, sophisticated, statuesque, and worldly. Then Harry Hardyng was unfortunately everything Jaime wasn’t—immature, unsophisticated, inconsiderate, and always saying the wrong thing.

_Seven gods, if you’re listening? Now would be a really good time to split the world open and swallow me whole._

“Uh, Harry,” Sansa pointed to the dance floor and it’s seven-piece band in an attempt to escape the awkwardness of their four-person standoff. “let’s go dance!”

“But,” Harry began petulantly, “they smuggled in a keg behind the tennis courts and I’m the only one with a tap!”

She took him by the lapels. “Now!”

Jaime reached out to grasp Sansa by her elbow, his thumb warmly stroking her skin as his pleading eyes met hers. “I’ll catch up with you later, Sansa.”

“Sure thing, Mr. Lannister.” Sansa replied sarcastically, shaking off his hand as inconspicuously as she could. “Maybe a few years from now at Myrcella’s baby shower we can have a glass of punch together.”

He clenched his eyes shut and let her go.

As Jaime remained amongst the standing guests, he stared after her, thinking she was something he shouldn’t want, but did.

And as Sansa twirled among the dancers, she avoided his stare, _knowing_ he was something she shouldn’t want, but did.

 

 

 

A year later, Sansa let the conference room door slam shut behind her and stomped through the halls of the magazine offices where she was an intern, feeling the hot pin-prick of tears grow behind her eyes with each step. But she refused to let them fall until she was alone.

In the previous months, she had been one of _The Red Lady_ magazine’s most promising new hires. But now, she was pitching such bad ideas that the publication’s (admittedly very acerbic) editor-in-chief was throwing her out of staff meetings until she could ‘ _join us here in the land of people worth my time’_.

“Sansa!” Shae, her best work friend-turned roommate called out after her, running to catch up with Sansa as fast as she could on the four-inch heels she was fond of wearing when she wasn’t on dates with her boyfriend, Tyrion Lannister.

“What?” Sansa bellowed as Shae reached her. “If you’re going to try and make me feel like a worse employee, I’m not sure you’d succeed.”

“Sansa Stark,” Shae admonished, her accent rolling around the first letters of Sansa’s names. “you know I’d never do that! And you’re not a bad employee.” She took Sansa’s hand in hers. “It’s just…..what’s been going on with you lately?”

“You think I know?” Sansa practically shouted at her.

“Despite what Melisandre just said, you are NOT emotionally-stunted and creatively-uninspired!” Shae assured her, pointing back to the conference room. “You never have been and you never will be!”

Sansa bit her lip, knowing there was more her friend wasn’t saying. “But?”

“But lately, everyone can see there’s been something blocking you, something hanging you up.” Shae scrunched up her face apologetically. “Is this about Harry?”

“Gods, _it is_. And that’s just so mortifying!” Sansa groaned deeply, slumping against the hallway wall. “How can I be this out-of-sorts about breaking up with a man I didn’t even love! A man I can’t even believe I stayed with as long as I did? A man I should celebrate being rid of!”

“Oh, but if the ends of relationships could only work like that!” Shae laughed slightly, ruefully. “It might not even be about _Harry_ ……just about the end of something which you’ve invested over a year of your life, but gotten nothing in return.”

“I don’t have time to waste grieving the end of my relationship to Harry-fucking-Hardyng!” Sansa held her forehead in the palm of her hand. “Shae, there are fifty people a month interviewing for internships here at this magazine. Fifty people a month who could replace me at any time!”

“But if the Sansa Stark we all know and love shows up to work tomorrow, that won’t happen.” She looked around the hall and leaned toward Sansa’s ear. “As a matter of fact, if the Sansa Stark we all know and love shows up for work tomorrow….you won’t be an _intern_ for very long.”

Sansa’s eyes widened. “What have you heard?”

“Well, Megga will be taking a senior editor job for a magazine in Highgarden.” Shae smiled conspiratorially. “Which means, there’s a junior editor position open. And _you_ are on the short list!”

“Well, wait, aren’t you on that list too?”

Shae looked down. “Tyrion got offered a job away from King’s Landing.” When she looked back up she was smiling broadly. “He’s asked me to go with him, and I said yes.”

“Shae. That’s…great. I’m very happy for you.”

“So, if I’m going to be leaving, the last thing I want to see before I do is you sitting in that conference room as the very emotionally- _unstunted_ and creatively- _inspired_ new junior editor!” Shae happily bounced up and down on her feet. “For your sake _and mine_ , do whatever you have to do to get out of this funk!”

 

“What am I doing? What am I doing?” She muttered over and over as her finger hovered over the name on her phone. “I’m crazy, I’ve completely lost my mind.”

She sat down in her desk chair with a dull thud and looked around her office at the tasks and projects that made up what she thought was her life’s passion. And for the first time, it all meant very little to her.

_You’re just out of sorts. This is what you’ve always wanted, and now you’re putting it in jeopardy because of some asshole you shouldn’t have been with in the first place. You’ve got to snap yourself out of it._

“Desperate times call for desperate measures.” She mumbled under her breath, looking down at the name on her phone before hitting the green button.

“Hello?” His still-smooth voice answered.

“Um,” she cleared her throat. “Jaime? This is Sansa, Sansa Stark.”

His laugh was like thick honey cut with fine whiskey. “Sure…….’cause I needed you to clarify _which_ Sansa was calling.”

“Force of habit, I guess.” She giggled breathlessly in return, suddenly feeling a bit more at ease. “Am I catching you at a bad time?”

“Not a bad time. Just a time I didn’t think would ever happen.” His voice deepened to a sultry register. “You calling me, I mean.”

“Oh,” she inhaled sharply. “I’m sorry.”

“Sansa……..I _wanted_ you to call me. I don’t give my number to people I don’t want to call me.” He chucked again lowly, ruefully. “Well, that’s not true. Sometimes I’m forced to give my number to people I fucking couldn’t care less if I hear from again…..but not _you_ , Sansa, Sansa Stark.” There was a long pause, in which all she could hear was his shallow breaths. “Nobody forced me to give you my number.”

“Are you seeing anyone?” She asked before she could stop herself.

“No.” He answered quickly, before the last syllable was even out of her mouth.

“Do you wanna have dinner with me?”

“Yes.” He answered just as fast.

“Okay, then. Tomorrow night, at seven?”

“You still at the apartment you shared with ‘Cella?”

“Yes, but….” Sansa trailed off. “Margaery is still living there with me too. And gods know I love her, but if she sees you pick me up, it’ll be on the eleven o’clock news—”

She could practically hear the grin splitting his face. “I’ll text you when I get to your building and you can come down.”

 

 

 

“Can I confess something to you, Jaime?” Sansa asked, pointing her chopsticks at him.

They sat across from each other the next night, their cushions on the floor of the Qartheen restaurant they chose for their date making it seem like a cozy dinner at home, easing them into comfort and casual honesty.

He grinned over the edge of his tea cup. “Of course.”

Her chin fell to her chest and when she looked up at him, it was with shyness and a little guilt. “I asked you out because……well, I recently broke up with my boyfriend. I didn’t love him, but I was with him for a year.”

“And a year feels like forever.” He reached over the table to grab a mushroom from her plate with his chopsticks. “At least when you’re twenty-three.”

“Twenty-four, thank you very much.” She smirked, reaching to take a piece of broccoli off his. “Anyway, I seem to be in a terrible funk, letting the important things in my life fall to the wayside……..” she took a deep breath. “and I _may_ be using you to pull myself out of it.”

“Kinda like a defibrillator.” He shrugged, easy-going and understanding. “Do something wild and out-of-character to shock you back into rhythm.”

“Something like that.” She bit her lip and grinned. “You don’t have a problem with me potentially using you like that?”

“Worse things in the world than being used by one of the most beautiful and intriguing women I’ve ever met.” He smirked sexily, eyebrow quirking. “Better than you getting a tattoo, I suppose.”

“What makes you think I don’t already have a tattoo?” She winked as a low, tortured moan escaped his lips. “I haven’t determined yet if you’ll ever get the chance to see it, though.”

He put his elbow on the table and his chin in his palm. “It seems you underestimate me, Sansa, Sansa Stark.”

Just then, the waiter brought the check along with two Qartheen fortune cookies, and placed it on their table. Sansa reached for the check, but Jaime got to it before she did.

“I’m the one who asked you out—” she began to argue.

“Which you only had to do because, even though I wanted to, I didn’t ask _you out_ for fear of seeming like a total lecherous cradle-robber.” He held the check out of her reach, pulling his wallet from his pocket. “Besides, aren’t you a low-paid intern who has to live with roommates in her old college apartment?”

“Why, yes.” She smiled widely as she took her fortune cookie from the tray. “Yes, I am.”

He nodded to her hand as he gave the waiter his card. “What’s your fortune say?”

“Well, let’s see.” She cracked it open and rolled out the paper. “ _Sometimes, when you keep tripping over your feet, the best thing is just to fall_.”

“Hmm. Never thought cookies were astute,” He grinned, reaching for his own. “But that actually fits.”

“What’s yours say?”

He cracked his open, read it, then smirked wickedly—looking back up at her. Pupils blown wide as his eyes met hers. “ _You’re looking at what you want._ ”

“It does not.”

The heated desire written on his face was enough to set the heavily-draped restaurant on fire. “Cross my heart.” He made the motion over his chest. “That’s what it says.”

“Then show it to me.” Her breath whooshed out of and her voice stuttered. “Show me the fortune.”

He grasped the small parchment between his thumb and forefinger, making like he was giving it to her. Then at the last second he dropped it in her cup of hot tea, the ink blurring off the paper.

“Oops.” The side of his lip quirked up, his look of lust still not faltering. “Guess you’ll have to take my word for it.”

 

Sansa ambled beside Jaime as they walked down the scenic path on the banks of Blackwater Bay, her hair blowing softly behind her and Jaime’s probably $1200 blazer resting on her shoulders.

“So, this tattoo,” he began, smiling mischievously. “it really exists?”

She nodded, giving him a toothy grin. “It does.”

“And it’s……a flower? A direwolf?”

She shook her head. “Strikes one and two. You miss again and seeing it is off the table.”

“I didn’t even guess right with _the direwolf_?!” He shook his head in disbelief. “I’m getting rusty. Give me some clues. Is it an object? Or a phrase?”

“A phrase. In High Valyrian.”

He groaned and looked up to the star-filled sky. “Fuck. Now I’ll never see it.”

“Probably not.” She giggled, drunk on the good meal and the good company. “Unless I’m exceptionally merciful.”

They came upon an empty park bench with an abandoned newspaper resting on it. She took a page from the paper and crumpled it into a ball, handing it to him.

“Alright.” She told him, pointing to a nearby open trash can. “You get this into that bin from this distance, and I’ll tell you what—”

She stopped speaking, her mouth dropping open when she saw him throw out his arm and pitch the paper ball into the trashcan with grace and ease.

He shrugged. “After I left the guard and went to work for Casterly Enterprises, before my father cut his losses and transferred me to private security services, he placed me as a VP in financing.” He chuckled in self-deprecation. “Needless to say, I spent a lot of time playing trashcan basketball in my office.”

“Well, okay.” She laughed musically, but her shoulders then hunched slightly and she looked down to the ground, kicking a pebble down the cobblestone path.

He nudged her side playfully, trying to pull her out of it. “You don’t _have_ to tell me.”

“It says _Valar Morghulis_.”

“All men must die?” He visibly cringed. “Kind of bleak for a young woman to have tattooed on her skin.”

“Yeah, well.” She looked back up at him, transferring her weight from one foot to the other. “I got it after Bran had his car accident.”

“Wow, that’s um….”

“It doesn’t mean what people usually think it means when they first hear I have it. I didn’t mean it that way.” She sat down heavily on the bench. “But Bran wasn’t just paralyzed at first, he was in a coma for three months.”

“Yeah……” He said softly. “It kinda filtered down to me back then that your family was going through a hard time.”

“We were.” She nodded firmly. “The only thing most of us did was drive to and from the hospital, and then either sleep twenty hours a day or spend the whole night staring at the ceiling because we couldn’t sleep at all.” She paused as he sat down next to her, placing a warm, gentle had on her bare knee. “The few times a week we would even eat, our dishes piled up in the sink. Bills stayed in the mailbox, unpaid. We were all just……..it was like we were all just frozen with the thought that Bran might die. And because of that—life stopped.”

He nodded. “I see.”

“Then one day I realized, while _nobody wants Bran to die—_ dying is inevitable, _for everyone_. It’s always going to happen. What _didn’t_ have to happen was for all of us to walk around like we were already dead while we were still alive.” She smiled slightly, but proudly. “So, I was actually the first to pull out of it. I started making dinners and forcing all of us to eat, cleaning the house, paying the bills, putting people to bed when they’d been up for three days straight……and then because of that, Robb shook it off, then Arya, and then Dad. Before we knew it—while we in _no way_ resembled the family we were when Bran was healthy—we had at least stopped ourselves from falling apart completely. And so, when Bran _did_ wake up—”

“You were able to be the family he needed you to be. And you were what, 17?” Jaime had a look of awe on his face when she turned to him. “Gods, Sansa, Sansa Stark. I didn’t think I could like you anymore than I already did.”

“Anyway,” she exhaled deeply. “that’s what the tattoo means. To always keep on going, at least until the inevitable end _does come for you_.”

He stood from the bench and held out his hand for her, pulling her solidly into his body when she took it and staring deep into her eyes. “Fighting the inevitable does seem pretty pointless.” He looked at her like she was the best thing in the world, then traced a gentle finger down the side of her face. “Even if Ned Stark might kill me for embracing it.”

“Hmm, well,” Sansa grasped the collar of his shirt, leaning close to brush her lower lip against his upper. “Ned Stark isn’t here.”

 

“Fuck, fuck, FUCK.”

“Oh, gods. Oh, fuck!” Sansa rasped loudly as Jaime sucked her breast into his scorching mouth.

“Tell me you want my cock.” Jaime pounded into her relentlessly as they both writhed—naked, sweaty, and gasping—on the floor of his living room. “Tell me you want it fucking your luscious cunt.”

“I want your cock. I want it bad.” She moaned so thoroughly he could feel the vibration against his cheek, his head pillowed against her breast as he lay on top of her with her legs wrapped around his waist. “I want your hard cock fucking me so deep, Jaime.”

He looked up at her and pushed her sweaty hair back from her temples with both his hands, her blue eyes shining bright—both with desire and the reflection of the flame in his fireplace as it roared beside them. “You’re so fucking beautiful, Sansa. You feel so fucking good around me.”

“Fuck, Jaime! Yes, you feel so fucking good inside me. Do you want me?”

“Gods, baby. Yes, I fucking want you.” He massaged her breast in his large rough palm and groaned when he felt the walls of her pussy contract around his cock. “I feel like I’ve been waiting for you since the moment I met you.”

She gulped air as she started to shake from the roots of her hair down to her toenails, all her muscles tensing before a pulsing, white heat began to overtake her. “I’m gonna come! Please don’t stop, don’t stop!”

His ecstatic wails joined with hers and echoed off the two-storied walls of his apartment. He kept thrusting and he came intensely, his release shocking him with the utter completeness of it. He scraped his teeth across her collarbone and sputtered her name into her neck. “SAN-SA!”

They stayed clutched together for what felt like an eternity, kissing fervently with him still buried to the hilt inside her and her fingernails raking across the sweaty skin of his shoulders. Finally, he rolled off and out of her with a deep sigh.

“Well,” she began to giggle softly, trying to catch her breath. “that was definitely more than I expected when I asked you to dinner.”

“Good. I do love exceeding expectations.” He sat up off the floor, reaching over her body to tug the blanket off the nearby sofa. He placed it over her before burrowing into her side, chuckling as he kissed behind her ear. “And I do love your tattoo.”

“I knew you would.”

 

Hours later, he knelt before her as she sat spread out for him on his same gorgeously upholstered sofa. Her bare ass sunk into the silk brocade and her legs wrapped around his head. And she was finally feeling what boys since the 11th grade had attempted to give her with their mouths.

“Unh, ohhh, fuck!” She moaned loudly, sweat dripping down her shoulder blades into the small of her back and her fingers clenching hard in his hair, tugging on his scalp. “Yeah, that’s it. _Gods_ , that’s it.” Her eyes clenched shut and her mouth dropped open, letting out a wolf-like howl from deep inside her lungs as her whole upper body hunched over his head. “JAIME!”

He kept up his licks and sucks against her cunt until she forcibly pried his face from her over-stimulated center, instead nibbling the inside of her thigh down to the bend of her knee. “Gods damn it, you taste _good_.”

She ran a hand over her face and looked at him with glassy eyes, a deep pink flushed across her heaving chest. “Nobody’s ever done that to me before.”

His eyes widened, remaining on his knees before her. “Nobody? Then I hate to inform you—you’ve been sleeping with fucking morons.”

“No, I don’t mean—” She rasped out a deep chuckle. “I’ve been having sex since I was seventeen, of course somebody’s done that to me before.” She leaned down and kissed him fiercely, tasting herself on his talented tongue. “But nobody’s ever done _that_ to me before.”

“I guess I can believe that, when I was twenty-four, I didn’t particularly care if I was any good at it.” He bit gently at her lower lip, then moved down to nip at the skin of her throat. “You get wise with age—and get lots of practice throughout the years.”

He immediately felt her halt the deep stroking of her soft hands across his back, and he knew he’d said the wrong thing. His head hung against her chest. “Sansa, I’m sorry.”

She pulled back slightly and gave a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “It’s fine.”

He rose from the floor and sat back on the sofa beside her. “No, it’s not.”

“Jaime,” she stood to avoid his touch and slipped on the pajama top she’d found when he directed her to his guest bedroom, their first romp on the floor leaving her chilled from the cooled sweat of their bodies. “You’re forty-three. I’m don’t have any delusions that you’ve been celibate your whole life, I know you’ve slept with other women….probably _a lot_ of them.”

He laid down fully, taking up the whole sofa, and covered his eyes. “Well, not as many as that tone of your voice seems to think I have.”

“That’s not even what I’m upset about—I’m not even upset!” She half-assured, half-protested with one breath. “But—”

He lowered his hand from his face and looked at her again. “But?”

“This?” She pulled on the hem of the pajama top, showing it to him. “This is Myrcella’s pajama top. And I know she left it here because she and Tommen sometimes spend the night……with their favorite uncle. One happy family.”

“Yeah.” He heaved a deep sigh, staring forlornly at his penthouse apartment’s elevated ceiling.

“She’s one of my best friends.” Sansa shook her head ruefully. “And you’re her uncle, who’s twice my age.”

Jaime sat up again. “I’m _not_ twice your age.”

“Jaime—”

“No. I’m not twice your age. If I were twice your age, I’d be forty-eight, not forty-three.” He winked at her, but it lacked the previous playfulness. “I know they teach math at that fancy college you went to.”

“You’re splitting hairs, you know you are.” She sat back down beside him and placed a contrite hand on his knee. “Our families know each other. And there would be a whole lot of people who’d want to kill us if they found out we were doing this.”

“Me.” He tried to correct her. “A whole lot of people who’d want to kill _me_.”

She quirked both her brow and the side of her lip in a sardonic smile. “Are you really trying to tell me your sister wouldn’t want to have me strangled in my sleep if she found out about us?”

“Fair point.”

She took her hand from his knee and placed it in her lap, looking down woefully. “This is just probably not the best idea. Remember sitting in your car the first night we met? All the thousands of ways this could end badly? It still could.”

 

Ten minutes later, she emerged from his bathroom fully-dressed and with her gorgeous red hair combed back down from the tousled sex-hair he’d been proud to give her. She stood nervously before him, fidgeting with her purse.

“Sansa,” he joked dejectedly as he stood in his boxers. “most people are nervous _before_ they spend five hours having sex with someone, rather than after.”

She gave him a small smile. “I know. It’s just……I tried to tell myself earlier tonight that I’d be fine using you—”

“—as a defibrillator?”

“Right.” She bit her lip. “It’s just, now I realize I was never fine with it, never _going_ to be fine with it. And I don’t want to be doing this now.”

He nodded in resignation. “I don’t either.”

“But it’s for the best.”

He nodded again. “Let me get dressed and I’ll drop you back at your place.”

“I’m gonna Uber.”

“I can’t let you do that.” He shook his head slightly, looking for his pants. “It’s the middle of the night.”

“I already ordered it.” She walked to his front door. “Driver’s a woman—really good safety rating.”

“You still have my number, though?” His soft voice caught her before she could open it. “Anytime. I’ll always take your call, Sansa, Sansa Stark.”

She froze, refusing to look back with her hand on the knob. “You’re not making this very easy for me.”

“Good.” He responded truthfully, without an ounce of apology. “I don’t want it to be.”

She opened the door and walked through, but her sad eyes met his before finally shutting it behind her. “It’s not.”

 

 

Sansa laid in her bed two nights later, miserable after a disconnected and unproductive day where everything she attempted, managed to fail spectacularly because her heart and mind _still_ just wasn’t in it. She stared up at the circular motions of her ceiling fan and huffed out a breath as she kicked her legs out from her covers in frustration.

_You know why this is happening, Sansa, Sansa Stark._

_What did I do to myself? I just made it so much worse, for a whole new set of much worse reasons. I felt more in those nine hours I spent with Jaime than I did in the thirteen months I spent with Harry. And Harry doesn’t even want me anymore, whereas I know Jaime very much does. Also, call a spade a spade, Sansa Stark—Harry Hardyng couldn’t hold a fucking candle to Jaime Lannister!_

_But you know all the reasons you two shouldn’t start something—or keep going with what you started. For gods sake, be practical, be sensible. Make good choices!_

“Sansa?” His gorgeous, eager voice answered after the first ring. “I haven’t been able to think of anything except you finally calling me.”

“Jaime.” She held her phone to her ear and smiled broadly into the dark of her bedroom. “You feel like going out to dinner? Or maybe even…… _staying in for_ _breakfast_?”

“My keys are in my hand.” The gentle rumbling of his chuckle came through the other end of the line. “Still text you when I’m outside your building?”

“Uh-huh.” She bit her lip happily, throwing back her covers and running to her closet. “I’ll be ready in twenty minutes.”

“I’ll be there in fifteen.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	2. Whatever It Takes, Or How My Heart Breaks

They didn’t just fuck.

Not to misrepresent things. They did do that a lot. _A lot_. But they quickly found out that sex wasn’t the only thing they wanted or needed from each other.

 

 

“So, wait?” Jaime laid down on the sofa. “Is she in the past now? Or the present?”

“Well,” Sansa began as she placed the bowl of popcorn down on coffee table. “She’s now in the present, which isn’t actually _the present_ —her present, still our past.” She popped open her can of soda and handed him his. “But not the past she was in before.”

He wrapped his arms around her middle as she settled between his legs and leaned back into his chest. “So, she gets transported back in time through these stones?”

“Yes.” Sansa grabbed a handful of popcorn, placing a kernel in Jaime’s mouth. “She was a nurse in the Essos-Westerosi World War, and her first/current husband was a spy. And when Essos surrenders and the war is over they go on a second honeymoon to the Northern Highlands—supposedly somewhere around Winterfell. And she gets transported to back before the Southron Conquest—before Torrhen knelt.”

Jaime nuzzled into her neck. “You’re so sexy when you talk history.”

She pulled away from his mouth with a giggle. “While she’s there, she falls in love with a Northerner and gets pregnant, but the North is about to be ravaged by war, so her new/past husband sends her back through the stones so she can raise their baby in peace with her old/future husband.”

“And they just expect her future husband to raise this guy’s baby as his own?” He reached over to take the remote. “That’s kind of a dick move.”

She gently ran her hand over his and entwined their fingers. “Yeah, they both do some pretty dick moves. But you’re supposed to overlook it because they’re in love.” She bit her lip sexily. “Also, because the Northern Highland/past guy is really hot. And the Southron/future guy? Not so much.”

“What does the Southron guy look like?”

“Um,” She pondered. “Kinda like my Uncle Edmure.”

Jaime cringed “What’s the Highland guy look like?”

Sansa turned to look him over, chest to face, and quirked a sly brow. “You, _maybe_. If you went back about twenty years and spent more time at the gym.”

He pinched both her sides and tugged on her earlobe with his teeth. The opening credits began with her laughing hysterically.

 

 

Sansa became even more fit after she started her relationship with Jaime Lannister. The fact that she added two more miles on her morning run might have had something to do with it. Those two extra miles put her right in front of Jaime’s luxury condo complex.

She smiled and said ‘ _Hello_ ’ to the familiar morning concierge before entering the elevator. Once she reached the level where the penthouses began, she swiped the keycard Jaime had given her which granted the elevator access to his floor. Getting off the elevator, she used her key and walked through his front door.

She looked around and, not hearing or seeing him, she worried he might have had to leave for work early and she’d missed his call while out on her run.

But the kitchen was spotless, meaning he hadn’t made their breakfast yet—he usually left the frying pans and dishes for the housekeeper to clean up—and his briefcase was still by the door. She walked down the hall to the bedrooms and heard the distant sound of water falling. She smiled devilishly.

Entering his bedroom, she slipped out of her sweaty jogging shorts and tank top, leaving them on his floor. Then she stepped into his bathroom, grinning as she heard him humming softly under the shower spray. Trying to be as stealthy as possible, she tip-toed naked into his large granite shower.

He didn’t even flinch as her hands stroked over his wet shoulders and he groaned deeply as she slipped her arms around him from behind, leaning her cheek against his shoulder blades and pressing her firm breasts into his back.

“I’m just warning you,” he began evenly, “my girlfriend is beautiful, kind, and brilliant. But she’s also jealous as hell. And if she catches us, she’ll kill us both.” Both his hands reached back behind her to cup her ass. “So……we better do this quick before she gets here.”

She nipped his shoulder and ran her hands through his wet hair as he turned to face her. “Very funny, Jaime, Jaime Lannister.”

Their first kiss of the day was always the most passionate. Today was no different—and it wasn’t her long run that left her breathless as they pulled apart.

He ran a hand up her now-wet belly to fondle her breast. “What do you want for breakfast?”

She wrapped her arms around his neck. “You have time for blueberry pancakes?”

“Anything for you.”

 

 

 

Jaime braced both his arms beside her head as he thrusted gently into her tight, wet heat. They were buried under his covers with her sweet, breathy moans floating to his ears. Every once and a while, she’d reach up to push the damp hair back from his forehead and he’d lower his face to hers, claiming her lips before letting their tongues dance lazily.

It was slow. it was blissful. It was something he’d never felt before. Something he never thought would turn him on, to send his body into a rolling wave of yearning. But it did.

When she wasn’t around, he felt achy, he felt hollow. He’d missed girlfriends when they weren’t around before, but nothing like this. Not even close. He’d swim through the sewer sludge of Flea Bottom to reach her on the other side.

He felt her tighten around his cock and looked up to see her push her head back into the pillow, her mouth falling open in a quiet gasp. “ _Jaime_.”

Her muscles loosened around him and he kissed down her body to reach a breast, licking around her nipple before sucking it into his mouth and biting it gently.

“ _Gods_ , Jaime.”

He felt a quivering in her cunt again and that was enough to set him off. His thrusts sped up and he got a bit more forceful with them before he moaned into her neck and came deep inside her.

He stayed buried within her, he always did for a few long moments after they were done. They both liked it that way. He heard her humming sweetly and felt her hands stroking through his hair. He almost fell asleep and so did she—if the slowing down of her hums and her strokes meant anything—but her voice brought them both out of it.

“What time is it?”

“ _Sansa._ ” He groaned miserably, rising up to look at her face.

“Jaime, I don’t _want_ to go.” She closed her eyes in defeat. “But you made very good use of me in your bed last night— _all night_.”

He kissed her chin. “I did.”

“So, I have to go home tonight. Your doormen and concierges can’t get curious about me, or your neighbors.” She tugged on his hair. “And Margaery isn’t stupid. I honestly don’t believe she’d ever say anything, but if I spend night after night away from my bed, and spend night after night in _yours_ , it could raise a lot of questions—from a lot of people.”

“I don’t care.” He shook his head. “ _Stay in my bed_. Every night.” She began to open her mouth to speak, but he stopped her with a finger to her lips. “Every night, Sansa. Every moment that you can.”

She rolled her eyes, but smiled and nodded happily.

 

 

 

Sansa’s jaw dropped at his admission. “It has to be a $50,000 piano! It’s just sitting in your apartment and you don’t know how to play it?”

He smiled, turning on the fireplace and sitting in his armchair, knocking back a tumbler of whiskey-on-the-rocks. “That’s right. Can’t play a note.”

“Then why would you have it?” She crossed her arms over her chest.

“Honestly?” Jaime quirked a brow. “Cersei oversaw the decorating of the apartment in case I had to entertain business or political associates here—this of course, was before she and my father gave up on me ever being a socialite schmoozer and political wheeler-dealer. The piano was a status symbol for her.” He shrugged a shoulder. “But it looks nice in the corner, so I never got rid of it.”

“If I try to teach you to play,” she spoke sweetly as she came over and he accepted her into his lap. “will you actually try _to learn_ —and not just sit beside me on the bench, licking my neck, biting my earlobe and trying to undress me?”

“Probably not.” He chuckled lowly, wrapping his arms around her waist. “Nailing the piano tutor was a big fantasy of mine when I was a teenager—despite not ever taking piano lessons.”

She began slowly unbuttoning his shirt. “Well, if you’re into it……I have an idea.”

His eyes widened and he licked his lips. “Seriously? Slutty Piano Tutor?”

She smiled slyly. “Not exactly.”

 

Jaime waited patiently at the back of the auditorium as Sansa talked to a ginger-haired man near the stage. She pointed back to where he stood and Jaime straightened his stance.

Sansa and the man walked to where Jaime waited and Sansa began the introductions.

“Jaime, this is Mr. Sheeran, Director of Programming for Heartstrings Musical Outreach Foundation.” Sansa smiled encouragingly. “Ed, this is Jaime Lannister.”

The Director grinned widely and held out his hand. “Mr. Lannister, thank you so much for your donation. Just in King’s Landing alone, our organization benefits over twelve-hundred children who wouldn’t normally have access to musical instruments. Your piano will help us greatly.”

“Heartstrings routinely has recitals and concerts to raise money to fund their programs.” Sansa gestured around the auditorium.

The Director continued for Sansa. “The best piano we had to use for our fundraisers was a mid-range instrument at best to start with, and then it was routinely falling apart. This will benefit us greatly. We couldn’t be more grateful.”

“You’re welcome, Ed.” Jaime beamed genuinely, his eyes lighting up. “I couldn’t be happier to do it.”

 

 

 

 

He came through to door to find the smell of something—well just the smell of _something_ —wafting through his apartment. When the door closed behind him, she came out of the kitchen nearly bouncing with excitement.

“I have a surprise for you!” She walked to him and grabbed his hand, pulling him into his gourmet kitchen like an anxious child.

“A surprise?!” He took a subtle whiff as he came into the room and tried not to cringe.

She smiled broadly, walking to his stove and lifting the lid off a pot. “I cooked for you!”

“You did?” He smiled back at her and peeked into the pot with trepidation. “ _You DID_!”

“Peppercrab Stew with Salt Cod and Braised Turnips.” She proclaimed, putting a spoon back in the pot and stirring. “It doesn’t _quite_ look like it how looked in the cookbook pictures, but I guess that happens sometimes. I got the recipe from the Taste of Westerlands Guide. I thought you might like something that reminded you of home.”

He kissed her cheek, sincerely touched by the gesture, even if he was terrified of the mess that gesture cooked up. “Sansa, that’s so sweet.”

“Well, you’re always cooking for me and it’s so nice of you. So, I wanted to return the favor, at least once.” She grinned proudly, wrapping a soft hand around the back of his neck. “I went to the fish market early this morning and had to leave work early so I could cook it in time for dinner to be ready when you got home. I used some of your spices, too. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Of course I don’t mind.” He kissed her lips. “It’s probably the nicest thing anyone’s done for me in quite a while.”

She pulled away and ladled up some of the stew, holding the spoon in front of him. “Well, try some.”

He opened his mouth to accept it and let his taste buds catch the brunt of it. _Holy gods, that is fucking terrible._

“Mmmmm.” He smiled around the taste, refusing to swallow it. “That’s……that’s really _good_.”

“Really?” She smiled back and ladled another spoonful, putting it in her own mouth. Her face seized up _horribly_ and she quickly spit it back into the pot. “Jaime, that’s fucking awful!!”

He spit his back into the pot as well, grateful to be rid of it. “I didn’t wanna say!”

She ran over to the sink and leaned down to gulp water straight from under the faucet. He ran to the refrigerator to gulp down some of last night’s decanted Arbor Gold.

She began to laugh. “Why didn’t you spit that out _immediately_?! Why would you say it was good?!”

“Because _you_ made it!” He laughed back, the both of them dissolving into a fit. He walked over to the sink, letting her grab the wine from him and take a large gulp. When she was done, he took her face in his hands. “I will never let you cook for me again, Sansa Stark.”

“Yeah, yeah.” She looked down to her feet.

“Yeah.” He lifter her chin and pressed his lips to hers. “But every time I cook for you, I will always remember how lovely it was that _you tried_.”

 

 

 

Her hand was leaving smudges on his window, but she didn’t care. Not when he was behind her, pounding into her furiously, fiercely, and she could feel all his need flame out from where they were joined.

Her cheek and bare breasts felt wonderful pressed against the glass, the chill of it calming her over-heated flesh. And keeping her from burning up completely with want.

He cupped his hand loosely around her throat and pulled her back to his chest so that his breath was panting into her ear. “Uhhh, Uhhh, Oh gods, fuck. Fuck…..Sansa!”

He hadn’t bothered to yank off her panties when this had started, just pulled them to the side, but his ministrations had her so worked up that all he had to do was slip a determined forefinger into the front of them and she was practically going off before that finger even began rubbing her clit. “JAIME!”

With her release, he gave himself permission to fall into his own. Palming a full breast, he dropped his head to her shoulder, moaning loudly as he went. “Gods! _Gods, baby_!”

In that moment, she was happy that when she had heard his front door slam and he’d stalked up behind her five minutes ago—lifting her skirt, yanking off her top to shove her bra up over her breasts, and growling in her ear that he wanted her _right now_ —she’d been looking out the window at his scenic view of the Red Keep, and had been able to brace herself against the glass.

Because if she hadn’t, when his depleted body finally slumped against her back, they would’ve both sunk to the floor under the weight.

As it was, they had several long moments to collect themselves where she could feel his pounding heart leveling out against her back and he could feel hers returning to normal from where his arms were wrapped around her ribs. Finally, he kissed her neck and pulled out of her with a whimper from her and a moan from him.

“So……..” she began teasingly, adjusting her breasts back into the cups of her bra. “How exactly was your day, _dear_?”

“It was…….” he zipped up his pants, trying to avoid her eyes. “It was…….”

“I mean, not that I’m complaining.” She reached out to put a finger on his chin and gently direct his attention to her smiling face. “You basically just fucked me into your window. And it was fucking incredible, don’t get me wrong.” She stepped into his body and he instinctively opened his arms for her. “But what…..what’s going on with you, baby?”

He looked down into her eyes, silently begging for her to understand. “It wasn’t an anger fuck. I _wouldn’t do that to you_ —”

She gently touched his temple, kissing his eyelids. “But there are things weighing heavy on that wonderful mind of yours?”

“My father, Cersei. Being a Lannister…..” he hung his head low. “even if you try to stay away from all that entails…. sometimes, the things they try to make you do, the things they try to make you _think_ , and _feel._ All just for you to be able to claim your own name.” Pressing his forehead to hers, he took her hand and entwined their fingers. “It comes with a price—to your mind, heart, soul. And sometimes…..it’s just feels like too much.”

She took her other hand and placed it on his chest, over his heart. “Oh, Jaime, Jaime Lannister.”

“I walked in the door just now, wanting to fall apart. And then I saw you. And It’s like you _knew_ to be here, knew I _needed you here_ …..even though I didn’t ask you to be.” He pulled back and shook his head sadly. “And you took it away. All of it, Sansa. Just to be with you. Just to be inside you—you took it all away.”

“I want to.” She nodded, her eyes shining with adoration. “I want you to not have to feel that when you’re with me.”

He leaned in to whisper in her ear. “Just to feel your cunt gripping my cock. To feel your tits in my hand and hear your moans—I love the way you sound, baby.” He brushed the curve of her ear when he licked his lips. “You make me a new man. And right now, I’m not a Lannister……I’m just yours.”

They kissed each other fiercely. And this time, they _did_ sink to the floor. Happily.

 

  


 

Sansa was in complete ecstasy when she woke up from her happy dream to find herself in an even happier reality. Her head nestled against Jaime’s solid chest, his arms wrapped around her whole upper body and his legs tangled with hers. Her feet swept back and forth on his thousand-thread-count Myrish-cotton sheets and she let out a blissful sigh.

“Don’t move.” Jaime instructed softly.

Sansa froze completely, terrified as she whispered, “Why? Is someone in the apartment?”

“No.” She felt his chest rumble as he spoke the word. “I just don’t want you to move. I don’t want either of us to move. Ever.” He tightened his arms around her. “This is perfect. Just us. Right now.”

She smacked his chest lightly then settled back into him with a giggle. “Well, as much as I hate you right now for scaring me half to death…….I have to agree with you. This is perfect.”

The growling of her empty stomach echoed out into the room. They both laughed.

“Well, we may have to move so that I can feed you.” He kissed the top of her head. “Or else the monster you keep snarling in your stomach might break out and knock all the walls down.”

She leaned her head back to stare at his mirthful face. “Actually, there is a way we can stay in bed all day, be fed and be entertained.” She grinned, running her fingers along the scruff of his jaw. “But you’ll have to leave all the planning to me.”

He kissed her brow. “I trust you, Sansa, Sansa Stark.” And he let her go, to slink—naked and winking—out of the room.

She came back a few minutes later with a box and a book in her arms. She plopped both down on the covers of the bed and slipped back underneath, burrowing into his side.

He picked up the box. “Alright, Sansa Stark, how _exactly_ did you find _Pop-Tarts_?”

She pointedly looked anywhere but at him. “Um, they were in your cupboard.”

“I can assure you, they were not.” He quirked a brow. “I would never.”

“I hid them a few weeks ago in your back cupboard behind all your weird Tyroshi food.” She bit her lip at his stern look of disapproval. “Oh, stop being such a food snob and just try them!”

Five minutes later, despite his best efforts to resist, he’d eaten five of them. “Okay _, damn it_. Those are actually pretty good.”

She looked around at the empty foil wrappers scattered on the bed. “Yeah, but watch out. They’re highly addictive and not terribly nutritious.” She then picked up the book, presenting it to him. “Have you ever read this?”

He leaned in to look closer at the cover. “ _The Night is Dark._ No, I’ve never read it. I heard it’s supposed to be really good.”

“Very good. A total classic.” Sansa informed him. “We spent two whole weeks studying it in one of my writing classes. I loved it.”

“Great.”

“Wait a minute,” Sansa cocked her head to the side. “If you’ve never read it, why was it in your bookshelves?”

He shrugged. “You know, the woman who decorated my apartment was told to fill it with status symbols—a Queen Naerys Award winning novel is definitely that.”

She looked at him tenderly. “One of these days, you should get rid of all the things that were put in your apartment to impress people, and put in all the things that are _truly you_.” She kissed his forehead. “All the things that make you happy.”

“I put _you_ in my apartment.” He kissed down the side of her face. “You make me happy.”

She shut her eyes and sighed happily, before pulling back and handing him the book. “Read it to me.”

His eyes widened. “Seriously?”

She gave him a sweet smile and ran her fingers through his hair. “Your voice is one of the most gorgeous I’ve ever heard. I wanna hear you read one of my favorite books to me.”

“Can we take breaks every once and a while to, um……..” he traced a finger from her neck to the curve of her shoulder and looked at her lustfully. “ _stretch out our limbs_?”

She giggled sexily, pulling the covers tighter over them. “I’m counting on it.”

“Alright.” He settled back into the pillows and pulled her to nestle into his side, clearing his throat before he began, “ _The night is dark and full of terrors. But those who live beyond the wall have passed down to their children, and their children’s children, a tale of light: That one day a man—a man of humblest means—would wield a lightbringer, and win the war to end all wars. A war to end the long night, and bring on the dawn…………”_

 

 

 

Jaime smiled widely from his armchair as he heard the lock turn, knowing Sansa was about to walk through his front door. But his smile quickly faltered as her high heels stomped across the floor and she threw her purse onto the sofa. She seethed as she stood across the room from him. “So, are you looking forward to _Saturday night_?”

He let out a sharp breath and closed his eyes. “Shit.”

She balled up her fists by her side and clenched her teeth. “Do you have any idea how humiliating it is to find out you’re going on a date with my boss because she orders me to confirm your address for pickup with the limo company?”

“It’s not a _date_.” He raised his hands defensively as he rose from his chair. “I’m her plus-one at a benefit. I don’t even know her and I don’t ever care to. She has a well-known public image and my father wants her to be involved in some _public trust_ that he’s setting up. He asked me to escort her so I could talk to her about the opportunity throughout the evening.”

“Yeah. _Escort_ being the operative word.” She scoffed harshly. “You just talked to me about the price you have to pay to carry your own name and now you’re letting him use you…….I guess we can add _pimping out his son_ to the list of things Tywin Lannister is willing to do for business purposes!”

“That’s _enough_!!” He shouted at her, face reddening.

They stood quietly, each simmering in their own anger on opposite sides of the living room.

“It’s _nothing_ , it’s a favor.” He began again, trying to be calm. “It’s a fucking business meeting except with tuxedos and $1500-a-plate dinners.” He ducked his head sadly, looking to the floor. “And we both said we’re not going public with our relationship.”

She trembled slightly, on the verge of tears, turning her head to the side. “That doesn’t mean I’m alright with you seeing other people.”

He finally crossed the room to her and put his hand on her shoulder. “I’m not _seeing_ her. I can’t even think of her and _you_ in the same thought. My mind won’t even go there.” He cupped her cheek and made her look at him. “it’s like my brain knows it’s impossible for me to _ever_ feel for her……. what I feel for you. To ever feel for _anyone_ what I feel for—"

“Then why didn’t you tell me?” She stopped him, gently running her fingers through the hair on his temple.

“I should have.” He exhaled slowly. “And I’m sorry. But I wanted….I wanted to avoid _this_.”

“You can’t.” Sansa told him firmly, tracing a thumb over his cheekbone. “I know we’re not blasting our relationship all over public media, but we both said when we’re here together that we need to treat this like its real.”

“It is.” He leaned in to kiss her.

But she stopped him. “In _real_ relationships, you don’t keep secrets.”

“I know. I just…….” Jaime pressed his forehead to hers. “These nights, these weekends. These hours and days that I spend with you? They’re like my own calm, wonderful corner tucked away from the crazy world. And I didn’t want to bring a fight into my corner.”

She leaned away from him with reverence in her eyes, then leaned back in to press her lips to his in a deep, passionate kiss. As her tongue began to slide against his and his hands came up to cradle her face, she pulled on his shirt, walking them backwards toward his bedroom.

“I’m sorry for keeping it from you.” He rasped against her lips.

“You’ll do your penance.” She pulled back to smile wickedly. “She’s a horrid woman. You’re gonna have a miserable night.”

Then she unbuckled his belt, undid his zipper and yanked his pants down as they tumbled through his bedroom door.

 

When Saturday evening came, she even helped him put on his bowtie and smooth out his hair as she sat on his bathroom counter, with him standing between her legs. She reached down into the drawer that now held a few of her personal items and hid something behind her back.

“There’s another clothing item you need tonight.” She lifted the item and pulled it through her fingers.

He gulped and pointed to her hand. “Sansa, are those……..?”

“Yep.” She nods, flourishing a pair of her panties before his eyes. “Now, you’re going to keep these in your pocket the whole night.” She reached down and did indeed slip them into his pocket. “Understood?”

All he could do was nod.

“Oh, and if you notice that they’re damp,” she jumped off the counter. “it’s because I wore them,” she stopped at the door to his bedroom and winked at him. “as I laid in your bed, thinking about you……and touching myself.”

He groaned loudly. It was going to be a long and torturous night.

 

Jaime undid his bowtie before he even reached his front door, and as he passed through into the apartment he slipped out of his jacket, letting it drop to the floor in exhaustion.

He heard Sansa puttering around in the kitchen and smiled at her presence. “San?”

“Yeah.” She called back to him. “How was your big evening?”

He grimaced slightly. “Fucking terrible. I can’t believe you spend five days a week taking orders from that self-absorbed, arrogant bitch.”

“Well,” she shouted back to him, still not joining him. “we all have a cross to bear.”

He walked to the sofa and wearily fell down into it, leaning back into the cushions. “I truly am sorry about our fight a few days ago. I understand now how bad it must have made you feel, if you ever thought I was honestly had the slightest interest in her,” he shut his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “even for a single moment.”

“You’re forgiven.” She shouted again. It was silent for a few moments before she continued. “But you see, I figured with you going to a big soiree tonight, whatever I might be wearing when you came home, you’d still be vastly better dressed than me…………so I just decided to say _hell with it_ and embrace my disadvantage.”

Sansa walked out of the kitchen with two full wine glasses in her hands, wearing _absolutely nothing_ but a sly grin.

Jaime’s jaw dropped and he leaned forward with a slow, delectable smile spreading across his once-exhausted face.

She smiled back as she placed the glasses on the coffee table that separated her from the sofa. “You always said you couldn’t imagine me looking bad even in a burlap sack. So…….how do I look without _anything_ on?”

“Gorgeous.” He breathed out, his faced smoothed over with awe and lust. “Always, always gorgeous.”

She walked around the coffee table and perched on the edge of it, right in front of him. “I figured you would’ve had a bad night…….” she traced a tantalizing fingertip down the valley between her breasts. “and thought maybe you deserved a reward for getting through it.”

He reached forward to place a hand on her thigh and she quickly pried it off. “What?” He rasped as his face fell, confused by her action. “San?”

“But rewards are only given if you’re a good boy.” She raised her wine glass and took a slow sip. “Can you be a good boy?”

Jaime’s mind went blissfully blank and he nodded without even thinking. “Yes, I can. I can for you.”

“Good.” She smiled with pure want in her eyes, lifting a bare toe to run up his still-clothed leg. “Good boys don’t touch without permission. Good boys sit back obediently and let _me_ touch _them_.”

He smiled back knowingly. “Yes, ma’am.”

She left her perch on the coffee table and slowly knelt before him. “Can you be a good boy and unbutton your shirt for me? Not all the way—just enough for my hand to reach in.”

He shuddered out a slow breath and did as she asked, while she simultaneously unzipped his pants. She placed a gentle hand over his still-covered and now-very-hard bulge.

“Do you deserve a reward?” Sansa purred, leaning down so her face was so close to his cock that he could feel her hot breath even through his boxers.

His eyes were wide and his pupils blown with desire. He tried to answer but all he could do was swallow hoarsely and nod instead.

She reached up to place one hand on his bare chest, fingernails lightly scratching the skin and tugging teasingly on his dusting of dirty-blonde chest hair. The other hand snuck into his boxers, slowly pulling out her prize.

Jaime was already hard. Totally, utterly, irrevocably _hard._ Her hand circled the base of his cock and the flat of her tongue slowly licked up its underside, when she reached the tip, she slipped her whole mouth over him, engulfing him completely.

He let out a loud, wrecked moan and gripped the pillows on the sofa. “Fuck, _gods_ , Sansa.”

Without even realizing it, he let go of one of the pillows and began to tangle a hand through her hair. At that disobedience, she scraped her bottom teeth in warning against the underside of his cock, and pulled off him. His heaving chest let out a whimper and he caught her wicked gaze with his pleading eyes.

She instead began to slide her soft hand up and down his length, the stroking made easier from his cock having been in her wet mouth. “If my good boy wants me to keep sucking his cock, he’ll keep his hands to himself until I tell him he can touch me.”

He nodded and begged hoarsely, “I will. I will, I promise.”

She leaned down to lick him from base to tip, smiling at him saucily after she ran the tip of her tongue over the tip of his cock, her fingers skimming over it teasingly. “Mmmm. The skin is so, so soft. But it’s so very, very hard underneath.”

He dropped his head back to the sofa cushions. “Fuck. I’m gonna have this memory burned in my brain until I’m old and gray.”

Sansa smirked. “Well, that won’t be too long from now.” Then she sunk her mouth back down over him.

“Little brat.” He chuckled lowly, clenching his eyes shut.

Pulling off him with a loud pop, she let out a tsk-tsk. “I don’t think a good boy calls the woman sucking his cock a ‘ _little brat’_.”

He leaned forward suddenly, gripping the back of her neck and pulling her face to his for a fierce kiss. They kissed so long and hard that they were both utterly breathless when they separated. He ran a hand up to fondle a pert, soft breast on her heaving chest and playfully bit her lower lip.

“Then I guess I’m not a good boy.” He grinned passionately, running a hand to the small of her back before cupping her firm ass. “I guess I’m a _bad man_.”

She kept stroking his cock, leaning in to suck a mark onto his chest. “Hmmm, a _bad man_? I guess I could be into that.”

“Yeah, well,” he laughed breathlessly as his hand sneaked around to the front of her, fingers slipping into her wet heat. “this bad man in is never giving you back your panties.”

 

 

 

Jaime was thankfully in the kitchen cooking them a late breakfast (a _very_ late breakfast, seeing as they both refused to get out of bed for several _very_ good reasons) when the door opened and Tyrion’s voice rang out into the apartment.

“Brother? Are you decent?”

“Tyrion?” Jaime walked out of the kitchen in his boxer shorts. “What…..what are you doing here?”

Tyrion grinned widely and held out his arms. “I had to come to King’s Landing for last minute business and thought I’d surprise my brother with a visit!”

Jaime looked back toward his bedroom anxiously and prayed Sansa wouldn’t come out to investigate the different voices. “I’m very happy with the surprise of you being in town, a little less so that you suddenly show up in my apartment without warning.”

“Ahh, but I did give you warning!” Tyrion responded gleefully, wagging his finger. “In the form of about nine voicemails and as many texts left over the course of last night and this morning.”

Jaime could have kicked himself as he looked over to his cell phone, thoughtlessly abandoned on his coffee table last night in favor of him spending quality time in his bed with the beautiful and alluring Sansa Stark.

“The concierge remembered me.” Tyrion gestured up and down his body. “Luckily for me, I’m quite memorable. And he was happy to let me in when I explained I couldn’t reach you.”

Jaime again looked toward his bedroom and then heard Tyrion let out a small, knowing chuckle. Jaime turned to follow Tyrion’s line of sight into the dining room table where a breakfast tray was already made up with two plates and two juice glasses. Perfectly set for a romantic meal in bed between lovers.

“I see,” Tyrion continued laughing softly and looked toward Jaime’s bedroom as well. “no wonder you couldn’t be reached, dear brother.”

Jaime began to fidget. “I want to see you, you just caught me in the middle of something. How much longer are you in town?”

“We’re in town until tomorrow morning.” Tyrion responded, his laughter rising a little at his brother’s slight discomfort. “If now is a bad time, Shae and I will expect to see you for dinner.”

“That sounds lovely.” Jaime began to breathe again as Tyrion walked to the door.

Tyrion turned. “Bring along your lady if you’re so inclined.”

Jaime looked to the floor. “We’re not really……..” he sighed. “it’s a complicated thing.”

“Oh well,” Tyrion grasped the door handle, smiling before he walked through. “maybe some other time.”

 

 

 

That night at dinner, Shae had left the table to go to the ladies’ room when Tyrion gave a slow smirk that Jaime was most familiar with—it meant he _knew something_.

“She’s a very lovely woman.”

“Who?” Jaime asked nervously, taking a sip from his tumbler.

“Come now, dear brother.” Tyrion winked, lifting his wine glass in a salute. “Sansa Stark.”

Jaime groaned and put his glass down to the table harshly. “How _the fuck_ did you find that out?”

“Simply putting two-and-two together.” Tyrion supplied. “Shae had been trying to reach Sansa as well to surprise her with the visit, and when she finally got ahold of _Margaery_ and was able to drop by the old apartment, Margaery told her over coffee that Sansa is barely there anymore—instead spending all her time with a _mystery man_.” He chuckled lowly. “Add that to your ‘ _complicated thing_ ’ from this morning, it was like a lightbulb came on over my head.”

“Don’t tell Shae, alright?” Jaime winced.

“It’s actually not a bad match. The two of you together seems to make sense, for some reason.” Tyrion shrugged, his smile lessened though, “Are you ashamed of her?”

Jaime blanched at the question. “No. Of _course not_.”

“It could be potentially problematic.” Tyrion added carefully.

“Potentially problematic?” Jaime’s jaw nearly dropped in disbelief at the statement and he shook his head. “Brother, you always did have a flair for the understatement.”

Tyrion laughed loudly. “I’m second-in-command to Daenerys Targaryen, the daughter of the man our father betrayed and had committed to a mental hospital, an action that left her father dead and her a penniless orphan.” Tyrion lifted his hand to tick off his points. “Now she’s engaged to the nephew of Ned Stark, who helped our father do the betraying. But then again, Ned Stark also made amends by financially supporting Daenerys later in life—putting her through school—even though he was under absolutely no obligation to do so.” Tyrion looked toward the ladies’ room. “And I’m madly in love with a former madam who used to supply prostitutes to our brother-in-law.”

“Your point?”

“ _Life_ is problematic, Jaime.” Tyrion crossed his arms over the table. “Perhaps you should just lean into it.”

“Perhaps.” Jaime nodded.

Tyrion gave his brother a soft look. “You’re fond of her?”

“No.” Jaime shook his head. “I’m in love with her.”

 

 

 

“When do I get to take this blindfold off?”

“Soon.” Jaime assured her as he opened the double doors and maneuvered her inside, carefully so that she wouldn’t trip over the high-heels she’d chosen to go with the flowing and knee-length green dress she’d bought especially for this occasion.

_Secret_ occasion. Since she’d had absolutely no idea where they’d be going.

“Okay, almost there.” He told her, practically giddy about soon being able to show her what he’d planned. He untied the blindfold and let it slip from her face. “Alright. Open your eyes.”

She did—only to find herself in the dark. “Jaime?”

“Look up.” He whispered from behind her.

She did, and even though she knew she was indoors, she somehow saw a beautiful night sky full of stars. She looked around confused, until she realized she stood on the center stage of a circular auditorium. She gasped. “Are we at the—”

“—planetarium?” He finished for her. “Yeah, we are. You always say you can’t see the stars in King’s Landing the same way you see them in Winterfell. And then I just happened to remember I’m on the Board of Directors here. So, I figured I might as well wield my influence to commandeer the place for the night and show my girl some unblemished stars for her birthday.”

His eyes were beginning to adjust to the half-light enough that he could see she was tearing up. “Jaime, this is….just…..”

“I had them bring up the skyscape of what it would look like over Winterfell.” He then gestured down to the stage where a picnic had been laid out on a checkered blanket. “I got kidney pie with peas and onions, and lemoncakes—both from Hot Pie’s. Probably not as good as your mom’s, but I hear still pretty damn good. I did manage to have Wintertown Sharp Cheese delivered from the North, so at least that will taste the same.” He took a deep hopeful breath. “The same birthday dinner you always have at home.”

She was in awe. “I’m….oh my gods, I’m completely overwhelmed.”

“Well, you’ll be in Winterfell for your actual birthday, but I still wanted to celebrate with you.” He ran a warm palm up her arm. “Still wanted to be a part of it, somehow.”

An hour later, they were laying down on the picnic blanket staring up at the stars as she fed him pieces of broken off lemoncake. “Hmm, I’m still a die-hard chocolate man,” he admitted with a chuckle. “but lemoncakes are definitely growing on me.”

“So, I’m corrupting you, huh?”

“In the best way.” He leaned over to kiss her tenderly. “I have one more surprise for you.”

She rubbed her belly. “If it’s more food, I don’t think I can take it.”

“Sit up.” He requested and moved to sit behind her.

A few moments later, she felt something slight come to rest on both her chest and around her neck. She knew it was a pendant necklace and looked down to find a delicate _snowflake_ hanging from her neck, white gold or platinum and lightly dusted with small diamonds. “Jaime, it’s so beautiful.”

“A snowflake for my Northern princess.”

She fingered the pendant and let out a weary sigh.

Jaime’s face fell. “I thought you’d _like_ it.”

“Oh gods,” Sansa gasped, reaching to place an apologetic hand on his arm. “I do. Gods know I do. I love it and I’ll never take it off.” She bit her lip and blinked rapidly. “But I’m gonna be back home in three days, with this beautiful thing around my neck. And I’m gonna be sitting at our family table, surrounded by my favorite people, eating my favorite meal.”

“And?”

“And it’s gonna feel like something’s missing because you’re not there.”

He sadly touched his forehead to hers. “Yeah.”

 

 

 

When Jaime’s phone rang at work, he was quick answer on only the second ring. It was the call he’d been waiting for all day. “So?” He slipped into his office, shutting the door behind him. “How did it go?”

Sansa had given the final presentation of the first project she’d been given since she was made junior editor at _The Red Lady_ , six weeks after she’d started seeing Jaime. And she was beyond nervous because it was the first time she’d led a project, and she wanted it to be perfect.

“Great! It went great!” She shouted happily through the phone. “She smiled, Jaime. Melisandre actually fucking smiled!”

Jaime laughed, sinking into his desk chair. “I knew she’d love it. You worked so hard, and it was perfect.”

And he truly believed it was. _The Red Lady_ wasn’t exactly his type of magazine, but even he had to admit Sansa’s article and corresponding layout was one of the best he’d ever seen. It had been a part of his life as much as Sansa’s. She worked on it at his apartment—asked his opinions and considered his suggestions.

And she cared so much about making it good. So naturally, he knew it would be perfect.

Sansa giggled. “Margaery knows it went well, and she and some of the girls are going to take me out for drinks tonight. But I’ll be with you later tonight so we can celebrate.”

“Looking forward to it.” He smiled slowly, the words drawling out like honey. “Just don’t get so drunk that I’ll feel guilty about ravishing you tonight. Because I fully intend to ravish you.”

 

 

When she walked through the door later that night, he was spread out on the sofa, reading a work folder. He looked up at her and lifted a brow.

“Pleasantly buzzed.” She responded to the unspoken question, walking to the sofa. “But still have full control of my faculties and am waiting to be ravished, Ser Jaime Lannister.”

He laughed as she dropped her purse on the floor, took off her coat, and laid down on top of him, molding herself into his body. She began humming blissfully as he ran his fingers through her hair.

“So……there’s this little island about ten miles off the coast of Lannisport. It’s called Rocky Shore.” He spoke softly to the top of her head. “Nothing really special about it—just beaches and about three-hundred residents.”

“Mm-hmm.” She stayed how she was. “And is there a reason you’re giving me a geography lesson when you’re supposed to be ravishing me?”

“I have a house there, right on the water.” He continued. “Well, not really _a house_. Just a shack with a kitchen, a bathroom…….a _bed_.”

Her arms wrapped tighter around him. “Mm-hmm.”

“You have a three-day weekend for Good Queen Alysanne Day, don’t you?”

“Mm-hmm.”

He sighed happily. “Last night, I had a dream about you dancing in the surf on that island. So beautiful. It was a really good dream, and I can’t stop thinking about actually seeing it.”

She lifted her head and looked deeply in his eyes, smiling sweetly. “Well, then. I guess you better take me to Rocky Shore.”

 

 

 

Jaime and Sansa made it to Rocky Shore on the last ferry of Friday night. He’d arranged for the caretaker to transport the car Jaime kept on the island to the parking lot by the port.

It was too late to really do anything, so they just went to the small market on the island to get food and supplies for their three-day stay. Leaving the market, Jaime noticed the fish-sandwich cart was still open by the docks and they stopped so he could feed his famished girlfriend.

When Sansa walked through the door of his house—and it really was almost just a shack—her jaw dropped open and her eyes twinkled with glee.

“Nobody decorated this place for you.” She turned to him, a grin splitting her face. “This place _is truly you_.”

He laughed loudly at her assessment. And it was true. Nobody else came to this place. Cersei and his father had never been. Tyrion had only been twice. And even Myrcella and Tommen preferred the shores closer to Arbor Island or Dorne.

It held all of his remembrances of growing up in Casterly Rock, photos and trinkets of the boy he’d thought long gone. The boy that only emerged these days when in happy moments with the woman standing before him.

The house also held all his experiences from working and living in Essos with the Royal Guard. The token he was most proud of was the Dothraki ceremonial mask given to him by a Khal in recognition for honor and bravery.

He’s happy in Westeros, but most of that is now because of Sansa. He remembers when he actually used to _do things_ ……. besides organize the security logistics of a vice president of development traveling to Dorne to oversee a new factory. Or some other shit like that.

He used to explore, he built, he made a difference. But he’s older now and knew he had to settle into a new life and a new career. The funny thing is, he thinks he could be satisfied in a less-than-stellar professional life, as long as his personal life was good. And his personal life was very good.

It was just a secret.

Sansa took their bags and began to put their groceries away in the small kitchenette. Jaime came up behind her and put his arms around her waist, kissing the side of her head. “You look good here.”

She leaned back into him and dropped her head against his shoulder. “As soon as it’s light tomorrow, I’ll dance in the surf for you.”

 

And she did. And it was just as beautiful as he dreamed, with her gorgeous copper hair blowing in the salt air and her blue eyes reflecting the bright sun.

They swam. They searched for sea shells for Sansa to give to her mother. They boiled the crab they’d bought at the market, and she tried to crack them and get out the meat, but she finally gave up and let him do it for her.

He rubbed sunscreen all over her easily-sunburned body. It led to other enjoyable things and they had to go back in the house.

He built a fire out on the beach and she sat back between his legs, both of them staring up at the stars and talking to each other until 2am.

She woke up on their last day with the sunrise floating through the open windows. She sighed happily at the feel of his hand stroking the soft skin of her back.

“Sansa? I love you.” Jaime whispered truthfully. “I do. When we’re in King’s Landing. When we’re in Rocky Shore. Everywhere. All the time.” His other hand took a hold of hers and pressed a kiss to her palm. “No matter how inconvenient.”

She laid a kiss onto his chest. “I know. I love you too, Jaime, Jaime Lannister.”

“We’re going to have to do something about this.” He stated to her, to the world.

“I know.” She finally looked up at him and smiled tenderly. “I’m ready.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	3. I Wonder How We Can Survive This Romance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SUUUUUPER long chapter that's heavy on the narrative. But I needed to show that it wasn't just Jaime's age or Sansa's friendship with Myrcella that were impediments to them having an open relationship.
> 
> To make up for the heavy narrative, I included some of the filthiest smut I've ever written. :)
> 
> Also: Mentioned/Referenced Child/Domestic/Sexual Abuse, Violence, and Miscarriage. Not graphic, but please be forewarned if these are triggers.

The entire ferry ride from Rocky Shore back to Lannisport, Jaime and Sansa made out. Hard.

But the train ride back to King’s Landing, in an effort to be appropriate and restrained—and not have their relationship scandalously revealed to a gossip site before they could ease their families into the reality of them being together—they merely sat close to each other, holding hands and whispering endearments in the others ear. Some were sweet. Others not so sweet.

“Make sure to keep a straight face while I tell you this,” Jaime leaned in to whisper in Sansa’s ear. “but when we get back to the apartment, I’m gonna push you back against my floor-length window and bury my face in your perfect pussy.” He brought his thumb to his lips and gave the tip a delicate lick. “Hmmm……I wonder if it still tastes like the salt sea?”

Sansa’s face grew bright red and she ducked her head down, shyly biting her lip.

Jaime leaned back and gave her a devilish smirk. “That’s not keeping a straight face, Sansa, Sansa Stark.”

She put her hand on the collar of his jacket and gently pulled his face back to hers. “If you wanted a girlfriend who could act innocent in the midst of delectable filth, then you should have chosen _Margaery_.”

“No,” Jaime chuckled, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “I don’t regret my choice.”

They had thought the closer they got to the city, and to their real lives, they’d grow more fearful and apprehensive—but they didn’t. They just got……excited.

The train came to a full stop at the station and the announcer gave them the okay to disembark. Jaime rose from their seats first and held out his hand to Sansa, pulling her up and giving her a light kiss on her cheek when she stood before him.

“Excuse me?” A stout, badly dressed woman spoke up as she was passing them down the aisle. “Aren’t you Sansa Stark?”

Smiling broadly, Sansa turned from gazing at Jaime’s face. “Yes, I am.”

The woman’s face screwed up in disgust. “You should be ashamed of yourself.”

“What?” Sansa clutched her chest and stepped back in total shock.

Jaime stood in front of Sansa protectively, seething down at the random stranger. “Hey, what the fuck do _you_ know about it, lady?”

“Well,” the woman sneered back, “the whole world knows about it now thanks to Petyr Baelish’s exposé on _Westeros Tonight_.” She peeked around Jaime to stare daggers at Sansa again. “If I were any of Ned Stark’s children, I’d be ashamed to show my face. Your father’s an absolutely despicable man!”

With that, the woman turned and stomped off the train, leaving a dumbfounded Jaime and Sansa in her wake.

Jaime turned around, deeply confused. “What the hell is she talking about?”

“I don’t know.” Sansa shook her head, her hands trembling. “My _father_?”

Sansa’s broke out of her confused trance to dig through her purse, pulling out her phone and clenching her eyes shut. “ _Fuck_. I didn’t pack my charger, so I turned it off last night to save the battery and didn’t remember to turn it back on.” She groaned in disgust. “Of all the irresponsible things…..”

“San,” he rubbed her back soothingly. “It’s something anyone could’ve done.”

“I have fourteen missed calls. And ten texts saying _call home immediately_!”

Jaime shut his eyes and sighed. “Well, stop kicking yourself and just call home. It’s okay.”

Sansa held the phone to her ear, tapping her foot and biting a nail. “Mom?”

“ _Sansa, we’ve been trying to get ahold of you since last night.”_

Sansa remembered last night, too blissful to spare a thought to her turned-off phone, and smiled lightly despite the fear tinging her chest. “Mom, I’m sorry, I had my phone turned off.”

“ _Sansa, sweetling_ ,” her mother sighed wearily. “ _something’s happened_.”

 

 

 

For most of the cab ride back to Jaime’s apartment, Sansa was on the phone with her mother and Jaime was on the phone with Tyrion. Neither could believe what they were hearing.

“Mom,” Sansa spoke weakly into the phone. “it’s not true.”

“ _I know that, darling. Everyone who truly knows your father knows that it isn’t true_.” Catelyn’s voice waivered, close to tears. “ _But that television program was broadcast far and wide. Petyr Baelish, of all people! Seven gods, he was like family when I was growing up. And he puts these lies on his television program. For him to do this!”_

“No, Mom.” Sansa stated through clenched teeth. “It was Tywin Lannister.”

Hearing his father’s name spoken so hatefully from the woman he loved, Jaime froze. Several moments later he said into his phone, “Tyrion, I’ve got to let you go.”

Sansa stared straight ahead with the phone trembling in her hand, trying to calm her breathing.

“Sansa,” Jaime said softly. “Tell your mother you need to hang up.”

She did. When Sansa hung up, she and Jaime were silent as they sat side by side, not looking at each other.

“It _was_ my father, this has his prints all over it.” He rubbed his eyes in frustration and disgust. “He and Robert surely were the ones who did what Ned is accused of. But now with Robert beginning a campaign for Prime Minister, they knew the story would get out eventually, so they put it out there first to get ahead of the scandal and manipulated what happened to put it all on your father. Everyone thinks Petyr Baelish is a respectable journalist—but I’m sure if my father and Cersei paid him enough and handed him a juicy story, he’d do whatever they wanted him to.”

“Baelish also hates my dad.” Sansa shook her head. “He was in love with my mother as a child, everyone knows it.”

Jaime hung his head. “Do you hate me?”

“For what?”

“Being a Lannister.”

“No.” Sansa chuckled wearily. “I don’t know how this is possible, but I love you even more.”

He looked over to her. “I love you even more, too.”

“But you know this means we have to put off telling……….” she clenched her eyes shut.

He gently took her hand in his. “Yeah.”

“Just until we can…..until this blows over.” Sansa wiped under her eyes. “I can’t do anything else that might upset my family, and with your dad being the number one suspect of falsifying this story and bringing it to the public………we just can’t right now.”

Jaime nodded before dropping his head back to the headrest, not wanting to say what he said next, “We also have to be more careful and cut back on the time we spend together. You’re a more visible figure now, they’re going to be looking into your—”

“No.” She gripped his hand harder. “I’ll wear sunglasses, a brunette wig, and clothes three sizes too big, before I give up seeing you every day.”

“Baby,” he leaned over and wiped a tear from her cheek. “this TV program brought it all up again. Targaryen, Lannister, Baratheon, Stark…..it’s not ancient history anymore. And our relationship is the kind of stuff gossip columnists and skeevy photographers eat up.”

“Three times a week.” She pleaded, biting her lip. “I’ll cut down to only seeing you three times a week.”

He gave a watery laugh, pulling her face to his for a small kiss. “Okay.”

 

 

 

Everyone knew the story of the fall of The Targaryen Group and the family that owned it.

The Targaryen Group had been Westeros’ most powerful business, and second only to Casterly Enterprises in terms of wealth. The only direct competitor it had was Stark Corp, and even Stark Corp. could usually never compete with them.

Ned Stark had inherited his family business and ran it with Robert Baratheon in the second seat, but was in danger of losing it because they’d been bleeding capital trying to counteract the stranglehold monopoly TG had on the market. Allegations of this monopoly they filed with the National Financial Commission—who sent a team of agents to TG headquarters to investigate.

While the NFC never found evidence of dirty tactics to undermine competitors or illegal kickbacks to businesses who’d use TG products and services exclusively (both Aerys Targaryen and his close friend Tywin Lannister had covered their tracks too well), they were concerned with financial dealings and internal company memos which brought to light serious concerns regarding Aerys Targaryen’s mental health.

No one will ever know how long Aerys’ mental illness could’ve gone unchecked if Stark and Baratheon hadn’t contacted the authorities. But what _is_ known is that soon after, Tywin Lannister and the board of The Targaryen Group voted to have Aerys Targaryen forcibly removed as CEO and Chairman, and to have him involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital.

Once Aerys was out of the way, Tywin Lannister felt compelled by “principles and better morals” to voluntarily disclose all accounts of his “very dear but troubled” friend’s company to the NFC—and with that, it was discovered Aerys had been building a house of cards, and his company had no real money, only bad debt built upon bad debt and old investors being paid with the money of new investors. Once the Commission blew the whistle on these violations with a publicly disclosed financial report, faith in the company went up in smoke and the value of the stock plummeted as desperate investors sold at any price.

The Targaryen Group went bankrupt and out of business, thousands lost their jobs and millions lost their savings. The Targaryens lost all their money, possessions, and status in Westerosi society that had once held them as their ‘ _royal family’_.

Aerys, deep in his madness, committed suicide.

Rhaegar Targaryen, heir and oldest son of Aerys—who was actually working to make amends to their jilted investors—was shot and killed by a former employee who had invested heavily in TG stock.

Rhaella Targayen died giving birth to the daughter Aerys never even knew he had (it was whispered she also died of a broken heart).

Daenerys Targaryen and her older brother Viserys fled the bad publicity to settle in Essos where they virtually had to live as beggars. At least until Viserys lost his mind like his father and Daenerys went to live with a Pentoshi guardian.

Tywin Lannister somehow came out on top—as Tywin Lannister always seemed to do—putting his business weight and fortune behind his new son-in-law and Ned Stark’s former second-in-command, Robert Baratheon. Baratheon used his old know-how from Stark Corp practices and Tywin used his experience from consulting Aerys, to form Storm’s End Inc…….and again rout the market of any competitors.

Stark Corp. should have made millions, losing its direct competitor in Targaryen Group, but it didn’t. Ned Stark took what money he made in the immediate downfall of Aerys Targaryen, and moved it and his family business into more ethical pursuits. Stark Corp. made steady, but humble, money over the years. _Still millions_ —but nothing when you compare it to the obscene fortunes of Lannister and Baratheon.

 

 

People all over Westeros knew this story. But the Petyr Baelish exposé told another part of the tale: that the misappropriation of funds and corrupt business practices caused by Aerys Targaryen’s mental illness were not as devastating as reported by the National Financial Commission, and definitely had not been so grievous as to cause the mayhem it actually did.

But Ned Stark had used an old girlfriend, National Financial Commission agent Ashara Dayne, to falsify and exaggerate the data that showed the mismanagement of the company, so that it would cause the freefall of Targaryen stock and the downfall of the Targaryen family. Inadvertently also causing the emptying of millions of people’s investment accounts.

At Ned Stark’s urging and Dayne’s direction, even a trust fund that had been set up to pay for the care and education of the two youngest Targaryen children—Viserys and the yet-to-be-born Daenerys—was broken and used to pay NFC fines, leaving the two children orphans with no means to care for themselves.

The exposé stated that in addition to wanting to get rid of his direct competitor, Stark did this as revenge for an affair the married oldest Targaryen son, Rhaegar, had with Stark’s sister Lyanna, that left Lyanna alone and heartbroken. Coping with her depression by means of promiscuity and drug-use, she had an illegitimate child two years after the affair ended and died of an overdose when her son was just three-months old.

Baelish’s program contends the heartbreak continued months after the NFC report, when Ashara Dayne, guilt-ridden over her part in the scheme and the destruction it caused, committed suicide by jumping off the top of her high-rise apartment building.

The program did try to be fair—for all of about two seconds—by reporting that Stark ultimately regretted his actions, becoming involved in charities and directing his family business away from the sphere of King’s Landing and its cut-throat competitors, and towards goods and services that would better serve the natural environment and the well-beings of the general population.

But that meant very little to the millions who had lost all their money when The Targaryen Group stock went kaput. Or those who were shocked that he was cruel-hearted enough to leave two innocent children out in the cold, hard world…….penniless and alone.

 

 

 

 

Three days after returning from Rocky Shore, Sansa found herself on her sofa with her laptop perched on her knees. _Her_ sofa. Meaning the one in _her_ apartment. The thought made her want to groan even as she sat cross-legged on the comfortable sectional in her cotton hoodie that was so wonderfully worn it was soft to the touch like velvet against her skin, with a delicious cup of cocoa on the table next to her.

All the comforts of home, because technically it _was_ her home. But, damn it, it _wasn’t anymore_. Because home was with _him_ now. And that’s why she was so uncomfortable she could barely stand it.

She was blessedly pulled from her thoughts by Margaery walking through the front door, shouting excitedly. “Hey!”

Sansa beamed genuinely up at her friend. Margaery came over to the sofa and leaned in to place a kiss on Sansa’s cheek, which she returned. “I’m so happy to see you!” Sansa grinned. “How was your business trip?”

“Uh, good.” Margaery smiled strangely, giddily. “It was good. _Exhausting_ , but good.”

Sansa chuckled. “It’s gonna be kinda weird. Us both being in the apartment for the night.”

“Oh gods, I know. Ships passing in the night……” Margaery laughed, yanking off her coat and putting it on the hook before winking at Sansa. “I thought you would be hiding out at your secret lover’s nest.”

Sansa rubbed the back of her neck. “Yeah, it’s probably best that I’m not there all the time anymore. Things with social media and the press are getting kind of….weird.”

“Yeah, this thing that’s happening to you guys just sucks so hard, Sans.” Margaery replied sympathetically, scanning through some of the mail she’d brought in. “I know other people in your family are going out of their minds.”

Sansa lifted a brow. “You do?”

“Oh, well,” Margaery looked up from the mail, eyes widened like a deer caught in headlights, before she quickly recovered. “I mean, I can just imagine. Just yesterday, they had pictures on the web of Bran during his rehab appointment. Inside the facility!”

“Seven Hells! Mom must be losing her mind.” Sansa cradled her forehead in her palm. “Today at work, I had someone pretend to be a delivery man needing me to sign for a package, then when I came to the front desk, he started shouting questions and taking pictures, and he wouldn’t stop until lobby security came. Though…. I don’t know why anybody bothers going to the trouble, I’m sure my backstabbing coworkers take more than enough photos of me to fill up the websites when I’m not looking.”

Margaery cringed, then reluctantly added as she sat in a nearby chair, “The landlord spoke to me as I came in the building. He thinks someone’s going through our trash. Well, the building’s trash that is.”

“What the _bloody FUCK_ is everyone’s problem??!!” Sansa screamed, head in her hands. Actually _screamed_.

Margaery blanched visibly. “ _Sansa_.”

“Sorry,” Sansa immediately apologized in a soft whisper. “It’s just…..I was kind of on my way to being very happy. Happy in a weird, thoroughly complicated way—but still _happy_. And then with all this happening…….”

Margaery gave her a kind, compassionate look. “This mess put a halt to whatever it was?”

“ _Love_ , Margaery.” Sansa admitted, looking up at her friend through her lashes. “And not _was_. It _is love_. Very present tense.”

“Shit.” Margaery whispered, eyes widening in shock.

“And this didn’t put a halt to anything, it just means we can’t see each other the way we were. Because, well……..unfortunately this relationship would just make the story even more scandalous.” Sansa sighed deeply. “And I can’t do that to my family,”

“But when this all dies down?” Margaery asked, a slight twinkle in her eye.

“When this all dies down?” Sansa smiled slyly, chewing her lip. “Then, yeah. Definitely, yeah. No matter what anyone thinks.” She then shrugged her shoulders uncertainly. “But with people rummaging through my trash, I don’t know when that will be………and it’s like I have no idea when my life will begin.”

“Sansa, I………..” Margaery opened her mouth a few times before finally stating, “We should talk.”

Sansa closed the top of her laptop and swallowed audibly. “About what?”

“Well, Myrcella moved out long ago to live with Trystane, then Dany moved out long ago to move to Meereen, then we found Shae as a roommate, but she moved out long ago to follow Tyrion when Dany hired him—and so, we’ve been two people living in a four-bedroom apartment for the longest time,” Margaery smiled, getting out of the chair to sit next to Sansa on the sofa. “common sense would tell us we need to move out and find a two-bedroom apartment.”

“Yeah,” Sansa replied unsurely, thinking of Jaime and their life together, and nervously tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “that would….um…um…um…..”

Thankfully Margaery saved her from her stuttering and began again. “But for _some reason_ ……I don’t think those should be our new living arrangements. Especially seeing as you’ve been spending every night with your _mystery man,_ ” she bit her lip fretfully. “and…… I’ve actually been putting off telling you something I should have told you a long time ago.”

Sansa furrowed her brow. “What do you have to tell me?”

“Umm,” Margaery began, pulling her left hand from behind her back. “maybe I should just show you.”

And with that, Margaery put her hand on Sansa’s knee, a shining diamond ring resting on her finger.

“Oh, my gods, Margaery!” Sansa screamed happily, rising from the sofa. “You’re engaged!”

Margaery bit her lip again, not quite joining Sansa in her joy. “Sans, take a closer look at the ring.”

Sansa did as Margaery bid, lifting the hand to bring the ring closer to her eye, immediately recognizing the jewelry. “Margaery…….is that…….is that _my Grandma Tully’s ring_?”

“It is.” Margaery let out a deep breath.

“Who gave you my grandma’s ring?”

Margaery rolled her eyes slightly. “Your brother, of course.”

“My brother?”

“Robb Stark?” A nervous laugh escaped Margaery’s lips. “Tall? Dark auburn, curly hair? Adorable, sexy doofus?”

Sansa sank back into the sofa. “But…..but he…..but you….. _Margaery_.”

“We hope you can forgive us.” Margaery took Sansa’s hand in hers, her face silently pleading. “we never intended to keep it from you, but…….. it all happened _so fast_. And you haven’t been around much.”

Sansa’s mouth fluttered open and closed for several long moments. “When did this _happen_?”

“Three months ago, when he drove down to visit you, and on his drive back home, I hitched a ride to Eyrie University, so I could visit Ysilla Royce in grad school?” Margaery smiled softly. “Ten hours alone in a car with someone and you get to know them _really well_.”

“But Robb lives in Winterfell. You live here. How did you—" Sansa stopped short, realization beginning to dawn on her face. “Wait a minute….Robb is the ‘ _business trips_ ’ you’ve been going on!”

“Yeah, I quit my job when we got engaged a month ago—so, no business.” Margaery’s smirk was beyond wicked. “Except _Robb’s business,_ if you catch my drift.”

Sansa playfully threw a pillow toward her. “Marg, come on! He’s my brother.”

“And I love him, Sans. I really do.” Margaery took a deep, exhilarated breath. “And he’s so good to me. I’m moving to Winterfell in two weeks.”

“I’m happy for you.” Sansa smiled genuinely, but then her eyes narrowed and she playfully wagged her finger. “That’s still quite a thing to keep from your best friend, Margaery Rhea Tyrell.”

“Uh-huh.” Margaery crossed her legs and leaned back in the sofa, brow quirked. “And just _who exactly_ have you been _practically living with_ …….Sansa Lyarra Stark?”

“Well, that’s not……that’s….um.” Sansa fingers fidgeted around the string of her hoodie.

“I thought so.” Margaery let out a snorting laugh, putting her chin in her hand. “That’s so unfair! I know I have a reputation as a huge gossip, but not when it comes to people I love! And I’ve been so good about not just putting my hounds-tooth cap on and tailing you around the city to find out your secret! So, come on, who is it? An old professor? A woman?”

“No, if it was a woman—I’d have just told you.” A huge breath escaped from Sansa’s lungs and she put her hands over her eyes, peeking through her fingers. “Okay….um….it’s…..it’s Jaime Lannister.”

“What?” Margaery’s face was completely dumbfounded, right before a devilish grin spread across her lips and she jumped off the sofa, bouncing up and down. “ _Get it_ , Sansa! Oh, my gods, he is SO fucking hot!”

Sansa giggled and stood up to wrap her friend in a bear hug, relieved to finally share this huge part of her life with someone else. “I know, isn’t he?”

Margaery pulled back and made a face, laughing as she did. “But fuck, Sansa—Jaime Lannister? I don’t envy you finally coming out with this. You couldn’t have just fallen in love with a serial killer?”

 

 

 

 

The exposé seemed to be all that King’s Landing could talk about when Sansa went back to work after returning from Rocky Shore. So much so, that ever since Sansa had stepped off the elevators onto _The Red Lady’s_ editorial floor that first morning, a sudden silence descended every time she walked into a room, and her one-hundred-fifty co-workers would track her with their eyes whenever she’d walk down the halls to and from her office.

Even ten days later, it hadn’t let up—words whispered behind hands, dirty looks on sidewalks, the disgusted shaking of heads when a new person discovered her name. Yet another day she had to walk around on egg shells because of some report on TV that should have set off millions of people’s _‘bullshit alarms’_ , but didn’t because when it came to people and lost money, they were quick to believe anything as long as it gave them someone to blame.

And now, during the first night they’d been able to be together in five days, Jaime wanted to talk to her about it, even as she sat at his dinner table, just trying to forget.

“Sansa?” He sighed and threw his napkin on the tabletop. “You’ve not said one word this whole time.”

“Which should give you a clue I don’t want to talk about it.” She took another gulp of the Dornish red he’d opened for them. “But just in case I’m not being fully clear, I don’t want _you_ to talk about it, either.”

She stood and gathered up their plates. Hers still full even though the curry he’d made for them was usually her favorite dish. But when she’d gotten to his apartment and found that it was the dinner he’d made, she’d known it was his attempt to make her feel better. And that almost made it worse.

He followed her into the kitchen with their wine glasses. “I’m gonna call Hot Pie’s and have them deliver some lemoncakes.”

“You don’t need to do that.” She took the pot he’d used to cook in off the stove.

“I know I don’t. But you’ve had four glasses of wine and no dinner,” he pulled out his phone. “if you don’t eat something soon, you’ll have a stomachache tonight or a hangover in the morning.”

“Well, it’s my stomachache. My hangover!” She threw the pot into the sink with force. “For fuck’s sake, _stop treating me like a child_!”

He leaned back on the counter. “I’m not treating you like a child. I’m trying to help you.” He paused as she at least looked contrite at her outburst. “Though I suppose if what you needed was to scream at someone like a child, I’ve helped.”

“I’m sorry.” She walked to him and leaned into his chest, putting her chin on his shoulder. “Half the people hate me. Half the people are acting like they feel sorry for me. When in fact, I should feel sorry for them. _I know_ it’s not true, whereas they actually believe it.”

He kissed her temple. “The crazy thing is, _I’m not sure they do_.” He wrapped his arms around her neck while she rested her hands on his hips. “It’s flashy and scandalous, but deep down, no matter how much my father has tried to cover it up, I’m sure people know how shady he and Robert actually are, and that they didn’t _enter_ or _come out_ of this with clean hands.”

“And yet, Robert might be the next Prime Minister,” she reluctantly pulled herself away from Jaime and walked back to the sink. “and Tywin might be the man who put him in office.”

“Yeah, well.” Jaime joined her, standing hip to hip. “Sansa, even if your father _did_ have something to do with what destroyed the Targaryens, it wasn’t as much as Baelish’s report said. And your dad’s the only one who’s tried to make amends for it.”

She leaned down to underneath the sink, pulling out dishsoap and scrub pads, not looking at him as she spoke quietly, “You know about that?”

He filled the stockpot with water. “That Ned paid for Viserys to live in the best psychiatric care facility in Pentos. That once Viserys was declared unfit, your father paid for Daenerys’ upkeep? That he paid for her to attend King’s Landing University?” He took the dishsoap bottle and poured some on a scrub pad. “Yeah, Daenerys told Tyrion and Tyrion told me.”

She rinsed their dinner dishes and put them in his dishwasher. “Tyrion shouldn’t be telling you these things.”

“Tyrion knows I’m not one to spread secrets to the wrong people.” Jaime threw the scrubpad in the pot, putting his hands on her arms and turning her to face him. “Baby…….Dany’s devastated by this exposé. All she’d have to do is make one phone call, but—"”

“—my dad won’t let her.” Sansa nodded firmly. “He didn’t help her for good publicity. Or to assuage any guilt. He did it because it was the right thing to do.” Her hands covered her eyes. “Dad didn’t even tell _me_ about him helping Dany. _She_ did….. _Dany_ was the one who told me.”

Jaime pried her hands away. “You could take the choice out of his hands. If he won’t defend himself, someone should.”

“No.” She walked away from him.

“Sansa…..” he shook his head in disbelief. “they’re shredding your father in the press. You do realize the longer this goes on, the longer we still have to hide our relationship?”

“And I want to be with you!” She nearly cried. “Ever since we said we loved each other, every day I’m not open and honest about that is another day in my life that is just totally fucked up.” She ran her hands through her hair in frustration. “But I won’t go against my father. Or his decisions. I’ll defend his character till my throat is raw, but this isn’t my story to tell.”

 

 

 

For the first time ever, Jaime and Sansa settled on opposite sides of the bed when they turned in for the night. Not touching as they tried to fall asleep—and so, _not_ falling asleep. Sansa laid on her stomach, swishing her bare toes back and forth on his luxurious sheets. He laid on his back and stared up at the ceiling, opening his mouth ever so often to speak to her, then closing it when everything he thought to say just wasn’t enough to tell her what he felt.

Finally, “Did you miss me, Jaime?” She sighed audibly. “Did you miss me in the days we couldn’t see each other?”

“Gods, Sansa.” He groaned wretchedly and turned on his side towards her, brushing a strand of hair off her back. “It wrecks my mind that you even have to ask that.”

“The first day,” she pulled her arm from under her pillow and put the hand on his chest. “it was just like any other day. I’d just seen you the night before, and I treated it like I’d see you again that night. But as I started to go home, I realized I was going _here_. When I turned myself around to go back to my place, that’s when it started to hurt.”

“San, I can’t—” he stopped mid-thought and reached over her to cup the hip opposite him, pulling her into his body. He kissed her shoulder. “I started turning to say things to you—and you weren’t there. I started asking you questions as I watched that show about the time-traveling stones. And I watched a whole episode even though you weren’t here! I know you love it but…….that show’s really not my thing, baby.”

“No, you’d rather watch a cooking competition where the host screams at all the contestants.” She lifted her head and pushed him onto his back, putting her chin on his chest. “Why’s he so mean to everybody?”

“The show’s called _Hell’s Kitchen_ , if the contestants don’t know he’s gonna be mean beforehand, it’s their own fault if he makes them cry.” He laughed loudly, his chest rumbling with the force of it.

“Gods, your laugh.” She shut her eyes and moaned. “I missed your laugh.” She leaned in to nuzzle his neck. “It makes me so wet.”

“It does?” He lifted a brow. “What else makes you wet?”

“It’d be a lot easier to make a list of things you do that _don’t_ make me wet, than a list of things that _do_.” Her hand snaked down into his boxers and she gave him a wicked smirk. “The _don’t_ list is a lot shorter.”

He groaned and took in a sharp breath at her touch on his now-very-hard cock. “Well, surely you have in your hands _hard_ evidence that there’s very little you do that _doesn’t turn me on_.”

She pushed herself up and threw a leg over his body, knees now on both sides of his chest. “Slide your boxers down, Jaime, Jaime Lannister.”

He did as told, and yanked his boxers down to his knees. Once he was free of all hinderances to her touch, she reached back behind her, teasingly stroking her hand up and down his cock. He slid the t-shirt of his that she slept in up her body and groaned in the back of his throat to discover she was bare underneath. “No panties?”

“Surely you could feel that they were missing. I’m practically already dripping for you.” She winked as she stroked his hard, velvet length in her tender hands and pressed her center down so he could feel the wet softness of her pussy against his chest. She reached down to her center, running her fingers through her juices before reaching back, slicking up his cock and gently sliding it back and forth against the cleft of her ass. She moved her body languorously allowing him a sweet, slow friction against his eager flesh. “I was actually very disappointed in you that you wore anything to bed.”

He placed his hand at the top of her mound, turning his thumb down to rub circles on her throbbing clit. “Make it up to you?”

She yanked his t-shirt off her body and began to fondle a heavy breast with one hand as she continued torturing his length behind her back with the other. She moaned lowly and her eyes fell shut. “Jaime, did you touch yourself while we were apart?”

“Oh, gods, baby.” He pushed his head back to his pillow. “The minute I slipped into this bed and knew you wouldn’t be right beside me, I took myself in hand and imagined you writhing on top of me, just as fucking beautiful as you are now. My fucking hand started to hurt.”

“Aww, poor baby.” She took her hand off her breast and reached for his. “This hand?” She waited for him to nod. “And when you came, did you come all over your hand?”

He nodded again. Then lost all the breath in his body when she brought his hand up to her mouth and began to lick the skin in long, sure strokes with her hot tongue. And his heart nearly stopped beating when she took his thumb into her mouth and sucked hard, closing her lips over it before swirling her tongue in a spiral over the appendage.

“So,” She grinned slowly, pulling her mouth off. “you got yourself off _a lot_ while thinking of me?”

“These last five days I haven’t seen you?” He bit his lip and thrusted a little to increase the friction of his cock between her ass cheeks. “Or in the two and a half years I’ve known you?”

“Both.”

“Yes.”

Her eyes flew open. “Yes? Well which is it?” She halted all her movements and put a firm hand on his chest. “Wait, for the _last two and a half years_ , if you made yourself come, it would be while _thinking of me_?”

He caught and held her eyes with his own; deep, honest and intense. “Baby, every time that I’ve come—by myself _or with someone else_ —since that first moment you walked into your living room….it was you I was thinking of.” He took an anxious breath at laying his heart out bare for her to see. “Always you. Only ever you.”

Her lungs shuddered out a violent breath and her eyes glassed over. “Jaime.”

He sat up and wrapped his arms around her, fully and protectively, feeling her body shake with silent tears. He kissed her face and felt fresh moisture on her supple skin. “Sansa, baby, tell me what you need.”

She wrapped her arms around him too, fingers tangling in his hair. Her lips pressed into his feverishly before breathing against them, “You told me once that I took it all away for you—all that it meant to be a Lannister. And that when you were inside me, you were just _mine_.”

He gently pulled on her hair enough that she stared straight into his eyes. “ _Sansa_.”

“I’ve never been ashamed of my name, my family. And I’m still not.” She lifted off him slightly to put his cock right at her soaked opening. “But take it away, Jaime. Right now, I don’t wanna be a Stark………I just wanna be _yours_.”

He put both hands on her hips and pulled her down onto him, sliding easily into her slick, tight heat. “Fuck, Sansa. You’re absolutely drenched.”

Her teeth pulled on his lower lip before she slid her tongue in his mouth, dancing lazily against his. After several long moments, she leaned back, fingers caressing the stubble along his jaw. “I missed you so much.”

“I love you,” he started to direct her in the motion and speed they needed in their thrusts, until eventually he was just pounding into her. “I love you, gods.”

“Jaime, so good, so good, _so good_. Fuck.”

“You’re _mine_. You belong to me.” He rasped loudly before ducking his head and sucking a sweaty breast into his hot mouth. “Tell me who you belong to!”

“You. Gods, Jaime. I’m _yours_.” She started to sob in ecstasy. “Fuck, I _belong to you_.”

He pulled her hair to expose her flushed neck to him and attacked the skin with licks and gentle sucks as he pounded into her furiously, mindlessly. She raked her nails up his back, her teeth biting into the skin of his shoulder.

That continued for minutes, both too blissed out with the ardent, harsh movements of their muscles and the sheer lust running through their veins. Their worlds narrowed down to the glimpses of sweaty skin they could see and the hot feel of them sliding against each other.

Jaime held her to him, his cock pushing through the contractions of her pussy and his pelvic bone grinding into her clit. “Yes, FUCK! _Take it,_ take me into you, baby!”

She threw her head back and he could feel the silk of her hair brushing against his thighs. “I…I….oh gods, oh gods, Jaime, I love you, baby…..BA-BY!”

The clenching of her cunt around him was too much and he came with a silent scream, mouth falling open and eyes slamming shut. His cheek was pillowed against her tits and his arms wrapped tight around her hips. She began to lean back onto his legs, elbows braced on the bed as her legs around his waist loosened to where he was merely cradled between her thighs.

They just breathed for several long moments. He ran a hand along her thigh, kneading into the muscle, and then pulled her back up to him so that they were chest to chest.

He tucked a damp strand of hair behind her ear. “Is that really what you want? Do you belong to me?”

She took the hand rubbing her thigh and twined it with hers, placing them on her chest above her still-racing heart. “Always you. Only ever you.”

 

As he held her tight in his arms before she drifted off, she heard him say into the dark of the room….. “I’m never giving this up, never giving _you_ up. I don’t care what lengths I’ll have to go to, but I won’t stop until I make this right—so that we can belong to each other.”

 

 

 

 

Jaime drove his rental car down the rural road until there was no more road left to drive. Then he parked it, and walked maybe about a half-mile through a snowy, sparsely-wooded field until he found a grotto with trees so ancient that their roots grew above the ground to form stumps where people could surely sit. He heard the quiet rustling of the leaves mingling with the gentle, lapping water of a hot spring.

And right where his investigation had led him, sat Ned Stark on a stump beneath the red leaves of a weirwood tree.

“Ah, so my hard work paid off.” Jaime smiled, looking down at him.

At the voice, Ned sat straight up, startled. He narrowed his eyes at first, then widened them when he realized who was there. “Jaime Lannister?”

Jaime ducked his head, almost embarrassed to be interrupting this man’s time of quiet reflection. “How are you, Ned?”

“Oh,” Ned cocked his head to the side, blinking rapidly. “I’ve been better.”

Jaime put his hands in his coat pocket. “Yeah, I figured.”

Ned shook his head. “How in the world did _you_ find me, Lannister?”

“I _listened_.” Jaime smiled slyly, a knowing twinkle in his eye. “As head of security for Casterly Enterprises and by extension Storm’s End Inc, I often had to stand around and ‘ _protect_ ’ Robert Baratheon while he got stinking drunk and told old ‘ _war_ ’ stories of the glory days.”

Ned shook his head again. “I still don’t follow.”

“He talked about _you_ a lot. Even after the rift between the two of you, it was clear he missed having you nearby.”

Ned lowered his head. “I see.”

“He’d tell tales of times when you had to come up with an idea, or a choice had to be made,” Jaime gave a small smile. “and you’d slink off for hours to ‘ _that damn huge tree by the hot spring’_ to be alone with your thoughts.”

Ned still didn’t look up. “I see.”

“I know for a fact you haven’t been at your home, and I may have tricked your assistant into telling me you haven’t been at work,” Jaime shuffled his feet. “asking around Winterfell about a huge tree by a hot spring wasn’t that hard. Apparently this is….. _God’s Woods_?”

“No.” Ned finally looked up, straight ahead avoid Jaime’s gaze. “This is _the_ Godswood.”

“I’m sorry about interrupting the ‘ _alone_ ’ part,” Jaime ran a hand through his hair. “but if you’re trying to come up with an idea, or make a choice………I can help.”

Ned rubbed his eyes tiredly. “You’ll just have to excuse me if I find that hard to believe.”

“May I?” Jaime pointed to another stump beside Ned’s. Ned reluctantly nodded. “I know you weren’t behind the fall of the Targaryens, Ned.”

“And how do you know that?” Ned scoffed.

Jaime let out a heavy, resigned sigh. “Because I know my father.”

Ned finally met Jaime’s eyes. “I see.”

“I was only nineteen when it happened, but know my father suddenly became flush with cash right before the revelation of the Targaryen Group’s troubles, and he was searching all over for a place to funnel the money.”

Ned sighed too. “By the _old gods_.”

“I’m gonna talk, Ned. And if it’s all right, I want you to just listen.” Jaime nodded carefully, encouragingly. “If something’s correct you can say so, and if it’s not you can say so. But try to just listen.”

“Okay,” Ned chuckled without mirth. “what’ve I got to lose.”

“My guess is Father knew the commission would discover Aerys’ mental state and the Board would remove him as Chairman, but then if the company was still solvent enough to pull out of their financial troubles—Rhaegar would take over.”

Ned nodded. “That’s right.”

“I know all too well that Rhaegar didn’t like Father—and vice versa, because Rhaegar couldn’t be as easily manipulated as my father’s ‘ _dear but troubled friend’_ Aerys. And once he was in the top seat, Rhaegar would’ve surely shut Father out of the Board of Directors.”

“That’s right.”

“But I have a theory. My theory is Father did help Aerys falsely build up the value of the stock, but not enough to send the whole company crashing down. Yet, when Father realized both he and Aerys would be pushed out soon, Father sold all of his TG stock at the still-inflated price, right before he knew the value would plummet. And he had a windfall of profits he had to hide, so he found Robert Baratheon and funneled the money into the newly-created Storm’s End Inc. Yet another business he could control through a ‘ _puppet_ ’ founder and CEO.”

Ned looked up to the sky. “That’s right.”

“And he left Rhaegar with the biggest financial mess this nation’s ever seen…….due to Ashara Dayne and the falsified data in her NFC report.”

Ned was silent for several long moments before sighing out, “ _Ashara Dayne_.”

“I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but I knew Ashara—through her brother, Arthur. I served with him in the Royal Guard before he died.” Jaime smiled sadly in remembrance. “He thought _you_ were the greatest thing to walk on two feet, by the way.”

Ned looked as if he’d just swallowed poison, gazing forlornly out onto the snowy land.

Jaime continued. “I believe she _was_ asked and paid off to falsify the data, but it was by my father—not you.” Jaime took a deep breath. “And in a strange irony, she _did_ do it because of the affair Rhaegar had with Lyanna.”

Ned nodded. “Yes, she did.”

“Ashara had been life-long close friends with Elia Martell, maid of honor at Elia and Rhaegar’s wedding.” Jaime wrung his hands. “The betrayal of Rhaegar’s affair added to Elia’s already fragile health and Elia—”

“Died.” Ned finished for him. “Elia died and Ashara blamed Rhaegar for it. And because of that, Ashara hated Rhaegar. Hated all the Targaryens.”

“My father must have known this, known this vulnerability. It’s what he’s good at. And used it to get her to do something a decent woman like her wouldn’t normally do. He’s good at _that_ , too.”

Ned was silent, not disagreeing, yet breathing harshly.

Jaime’s face was void of all expression as he stated, “So, I’m right.”

Ned nodded sadly. “With Robert defecting to start Storm’s End and Tywin having the capital to fund it, I knew something seemed off about the Commission report.” He sighed deeply, head hanging low. “I went to her, went to Ashara and confronted her.”

“And she didn’t deny it?”

“No.” Ned whispered hoarsely. “Didn’t deny it, but she’d had no idea the devastation it would cause. She stood in front of me trembling with guilt. Nearly broken with shame, so sick, so troubled. And I should’ve taken her to a hospital, taken her to a doctor. But I didn’t. Instead, I told her……” Ned’s face screwed up in deep pain. “I said absolutely _horrible_ things to her.”

Jaime grew pale. “Ned……….”

“And later that night, she jumped off Starfall Condominium’s twenty-seventh floor rooftop garden.”

“Ned, you didn’t…..it wasn’t your—" Jaime tried to begin again.

“I knew the truth all these years and I kept it a secret. I walked away from my friend Robert for fifteen years because I couldn’t stand to see him act as if it’d never happened.” Ned shook his head in regret. “Kept these secrets because I had cared for Ashara, because if the truth came out, her name would be tarnished. But she paid her price for the role she played in this. And I’ll do my penance for the role I played in her death.”

“By taking the fall _for all of it_?” Jaime shouted in disbelief.

Ned looked at him, depleted yet steady. “I wouldn’t expect you to understand.”

“ _Sure_ ,” Jaime huffed sarcastically. “because I don’t understand people without consciences never thinking of their bad deeds as they take over the world, while people _with_ consciences are tortured by their bad deeds and wither away from it.”

“ _Jaime_.” Ned clenched his eyes shut.

“ _No!_ I understand it all too well.” Jaime crossed his arms, eyes full of disappointment. “I know you have a conscience, a strong one. But I never expected Ned Stark to be one of those who’d wither away.”

“It’s not always the honorable thing to bring dirty laundry out to air.”

“ _Fuck_ honor!” Jaime seethed, pushing Ned’s shoulder to get him to open his eyes. “I can guarantee my father put this all on you because he believed your honor would keep you from revealing the real story. And I’m willing to bet that Robert _sat back and let_ my father put this all on you because he thinks your honor wouldn’t allow you to get a friend in trouble. Well, if that’s the case, then fuck my father—for so many reasons I can’t even count. And you know what? Fuck Robert too! He’s putting his ambition to be Prime Minister over your friendship, and that means he doesn’t deserve to be Prime Minister—or your friend!” Jaime took a deep breath before practically shouting, “Ned, SEVEN HELLS…… _DO something_!”

“ _I have_ , DAMN IT!” Ned stood from his stump, finally showing some emotion. “I’ve tried to do good. Tried to live my life with honor and by a moral code. Used my business to try and make the world a better place.” He started to pace, letting the held-back anger begin to seep out. “Tried to do right by the last Targaryen left in the world. Loved my wife and raised five good children, raised a nephew who became a great man despite having so much against him because he lost his mother. Loved them all and tried to instill good in them.”

Jaime stood too. “And you _have_ ………they’re great people. And trust me, I’ve seen the kind of monsters that can be created when a parent doesn’t care about teaching their children right and wrong. But your family is suffering right now too, they’re being left out for the vultures. And the crazy thing is, I know you’d do anything to protect them, to defend them……..except the _exact thing they need you to do_.”

Ned crossed his arms over his chest, a determined look growing on his face. “ _Defend myself_.”

“Yeah, Ned.” Jaime grinned proudly. “Defend yourself.”

 

 

 

Sansa was surprised to say the least, when Melisandre called her into her office mid-morning. Aside from times they were in staff meetings, or times when the different editorial teams were pitching her ideas or finalizing projects with her, Melisandre spoke through intermediaries. And the sound of being directly summoned by Melisandre St. Rhllor was enough to chill a person’s blood. So maybe the correct word wasn’t surprised, maybe the correct word was fucking terrified.

The older woman was looking at her computer when Sansa cracked her door open. “Come in.” She looked annoyed when Sansa remained standing (even though that is what Melisandre preferred for people to do in her office) and gestured to the chairs in front of her desk.

“Sansa, we find ourselves on the verge of a tremendous opportunity.” Melisandre’s fingertips made a temple. “And we must move quickly.”

Sansa sat down primly. “We do?”

“The whole world knows what your father did.”

Sansa found the strongest voice she ever found in Melisandre’s presence. “He _didn’t do it_.”

“And yet, despite his reputation far and wide for being a moral, upstanding man, the whole world believes he _did_.” There was a condescending lilt to the older woman’s tone. “Which goes to prove every falsehood can be believed as long as you have the right hook. And now it’s your chance to bring them back to “the truth”.” The bitch even used air-quotes when saying _the truth_. “I want you to do an interview, and then a story to go with it. For our next cover.”

“Well, that’s………” Sansa blinked rapidly in shock. “I’ll do anything if it will help people believe the truth about my father. And I’m not trying to disagree with you, it’s just, please don’t take what I—”

Melisandre’s lips pursed. “I’d greatly prefer if you’d just spit it out, Ms. Stark.”

“—but if it’s just Ned Stark’s daughter writing a positive piece about him, will anyone even be swayed?”

A slow smile snaked across Melisandre’s face. “They will if you have an ally most people wouldn’t expect to be on your side.”

“Who?”

“Daenerys Targaryen.”

Sansa swallowed audibly and didn’t speak for several long moments.

“Everything is being drudged up again. We know the two of you shared an apartment while at KLU, and are still dear friends.” Melisandre lifted a wine-colored brow. “Don’t you think that’s odd?”

Sansa looked to her lap. “I can’t really say what’s odd.”

“The fact that your father paid for her education has already been dug up. And records stating Daenerys was put in a group home after being processed through the Pentoshi court system at fourteen have been discovered as well.” Melisandre took her thick-rimmed reading glasses off the desk and picked up a file. “But she was only there for a short time before proper guardianship was found for her by an outside party. I bet if we dig deeper, we’ll find _your father_ was that outside party.”

Sansa nodded. “But I won’t reveal any of that unless both agree.”

Everyone who knew Melisandre knew she had a way of ignoring what someone said if she thought it wasn’t important to her train of thought. She did that with Sansa’s last statement as she continued to read the file. “Well, of course it makes sense your father would do that to assuage his guilt.”

“No.” Sansa’s word was so firm it even got the other woman to look up. “My father did it because it was the _right thing to do_.”

“Yes, sure, that.” Melisandre waved a patronizing hand. “You can use your friendship to get Daenerys to tell her/your story. And if she’s the type of person who holds a shred of gratitude—she’ll do it.”

Sansa shakes her head. “I don’t want to use my friendship.”

Again, Melisandre speaks as if Sansa hadn’t. “Daenerys commending your father for his kindness and generosity and telling the world of how he changed her life will be the bulk of the interview. The other information about her you can reveal in _your_ part of the story.”

Sansa furrowed her brow. “Other information?”

“There are suspicions, rumors…..” Melisandre sat back in her chair. “Not evidence, though. About Daenerys’ life before your father found her in that group home. Before he was allowed to help her.”

“Off the record,” Sansa began carefully. “Dany told me that even though my father tried to help through intermediaries, Viserys’ madness began early, and in his resentment, he would never accept help from ‘ _a Stark’_ , even if it meant them having to live by more dangerous means.”

“Yes,” Melisandre glanced over the file again as if she’s bored. “it’s those ‘ _more dangerous means_ ’ that you’ll reveal in your story.”

Sansa went completely pale, knowing in her mind and fearing in her heart what Melisandre meant. “I _won’t._ ”

Having ignored Sansa’s refusal, Melisandre continues, “There are rumors of attempted rape, the stabbing death of a Dothraki drug kingpin/gang leader she had a relationship with—not to mention the killing of the subordinate he fought to the death in retaliation for the attempted rape. There’s also the verified fact that Viserys Targaryen was committed to a psych facility, but then the rumors attached say it was necessary because he tried to beat his sister to death.”

Sansa shouted. “Melisandre, _stop_!”

Melisandre folded her hands on her desk, and calmly looked at Sansa. “And there are the hospital records that work with the timeline of those events……. of a fourteen-year-old Jane Doe suffering a late-term miscarriage at a charity hospital before being processed into the system by Children and Family Services.”

“All those records should be sealed.” Sansa responded weakly, tired from this horrible conversation.

“Such a hard life for such a young woman.”

Sansa shook her head. “Daenerys would never confirm this, even if I asked her to for the story.”

“It doesn’t need to be verified by records or confirmed by her. Just heavily implied.” Melisandre put her chin in her palm excitedly. “It’s juicier that way. Just lay out the dirty rumors and steer the reader in the right direction.”

“Why would I reveal any of this?” Sansa uttered through clenched teeth. “How would _any of that_ help my father?”

“If we told how she was allowed to be passed around in a drug gang so that her brother could live a more comfortable life at her expense? If we told that she witnessed incredible violence first hand, been knocked up at fourteen but lost the baby because her crazy brother tried to kill her?” Melisandre smiled deviously. “It would surely make your father seem like a saint for finally being able to come to her rescue.”

“I won’t reveal that.” Sansa repeated.

“Surely she must have told you.” Melisandre’s sickening smile continued. “With you being—against all odds—her _very good friend_.”

Sansa’s throat and mouth went dry. “And do you have any idea what that friendship means?”

“Oh, come now.” Melisandre waved a dismissive hand. “Who knows? If they can somehow manage to not be disgusted by her seedy past, the public might pity her, and she could even gain a begrudging respect.”

Sansa shook her head in disgust. “At the cost of her friend betraying her and revealing painful secrets of her past that she never wanted revealed.”

Melisandre pushed back her chair and crossed her legs. “This isn’t about her.”

“Except it is. It’s _exactly, literally_ about her.”

“It’s also about your father, garnering support for him.” Melisandre examined her nails. “And it would _help you_ ……..the piece would be widely read…….phenomenal for your career.”

Sansa shut her eyes and smiled ruefully. “You mean phenomenal for the magazine.”

“Well, of course the magazine would benefit!” Melisandre cackled harshly. “I’m not a Septa offering you charity with this opportunity. But even so, you’d be a fool not to take it.” Melisandre pulled her chair forward to her desk again. “It’s your father’s good name and your dream of being a well-known writer versus some damaged orphan you were friends with in college. Sansa, it’s _not a hard choice_.”

Sansa scoffed. “You’re right. _It’s not_.”

“Great.” Melisandre clapped once, actually believing that Sansa had agreed. “You’re a smart girl, and you have a strong vision of how you want your world to be— _this_ can make it a reality.”

“I’m _not doing it_ , Melisandre! And I’m seriously rethinking how I present myself to the world if you ever thought for a moment that I would.” Sansa chuckled in revulsion. “I’d never want _any_ world if I had to do what you’re suggesting to make it a reality.”

Melisandre’s eyes went wide, then a scowl grew on her face. “I’m disappointed. I thought surely you would’ve learned something from me.” Her eyes narrowed, lips pressing in a thin line. “Any vision one has of what they want their world to be will never come to be if you don’t offer up a few sacrifices along the way.”

A low derisive laugh escaped Sansa’s mouth. “And that’s why anyone you’d consider a friend would stab you in the back in a heartbeat if it would get them ahead. And you’d to the same. That’s why everyone thinks your evil.”

Melisandre lifted a haughty brow. “Your point being?”

“My point being is that my _skin is crawling_ , my point being is that I can barely stand to be in the same room as you.” Sansa stood from the chair and smoothed down her skirt. “My point being is that I’m going home.”

“Sansa,” Melisandre cocked her head to the side, lip quirking. “I suggest you think long and hard about what you do and say next.”

“Thanks for the suggestion, Melisandre.” Sansa walked to the door and opened it before looking back one last time and giving a bright grin. “ _Go fuck yourself_.”

 

 

 

Jaime was over-the-moon to walk into his apartment and find Sansa sitting sideways in his leather armchair by the fireplace, her copper hair flowing off one arm, and her gorgeous long legs hanging over the other. She had a glass tumbler precariously resting on her belly.

“You should keep gin or vodka or some clear liquor in your bar.” She announced without preface, words slightly slurring into each other. “This whiskey burns as it goes down.”

“ _Real men drink only dark liquor_.” Jaime mocked in a booming voice, smiling slyly. “My father pounded that into me since I was old enough to shave.”

“Well,” she swung her legs back and forth, giving him a wink. “your father is full of shit.”

He grinned back at her. “ _That_ we have fully established.”

“Where have you been?” She pouted, twirling a strand of hair. “I have to do serious cloak-and-dagger shit to get to your apartment without being noticed and you’re not even here.”

“I just had something to take care of.” He walked over to her, bent down and placed a kiss on her forehead. “I’ll tell you about it later.” He took the tumbler off her belly and knocked it back, finishing it. “Why are you draining my liquor cabinet before the sun’s even gone down?”

“I had a bit of a day.” She shrugged and let him pull her out of the chair. “I’ll tell you about it later.”

He stood before her for the first time in three days and wrapped his arms around her waist, hers instinctively going around his neck, before pressing his lips to hers and claiming her mouth in a scorching kiss.

He began to pull her shirt from her waistband as he walked her backwards to his couch. She messed up his hair beyond redemption, carding her fingers through it and scratching his scalp lightly in the way he loved. He had just fallen into the cushions and pulled her down on top of him, when her phone started to ring.

Her arm reached out for it on the coffee table while she still tried to keep her mouth fused to his. She was failing. And nearly falling off him.

“Seriously?” He chuckled, changing his fiery kiss to small, playful pecks around her mouth. “You’re more interested in your phone than me?”

She laughed bodily, and he anchored her to him as she leaned off him enough to reach the phone. “Not normally, but I left a kinda weird, slightly concerning message on Margaery’s voicemail and I don’t want her to be worried about me.”

He rubbed her back as her upper body hung off the sofa. “Marg? Hey, listen, I know my message was weird, but I’m really okay now and—” Sansa stopped talking and confusion marred her face. “Wait, what? When, why, how……..well, Margaery, you’re calling to tell me about it, I’d thought you’d at least have _some_ answers.”

Jaime lifted a questioning brow and she shrugged, climbing off him to stand beside the coffee table.

“Okay, Marg. I gotta go, I’ll call you after it’s done.” She hung up and looked to him. “Where’s your notepad computer?”

“Um…..” He put his head back on the cushion. “Desk in the alcove by the kitchen.”

She walked away, shouting back. “There’s been notifications all over the web that the President and Founder of Khaleesi Apparel & Cosmetics is going to livestream an announcement in two minutes.”

“Dany?” He sat up and adjusted the pillows so he could sit with her beside him when she came back. “Don’t people from your generation livestream all the time?”

“Yeah.” She came back in with his device and curled up next to him. “But it’s the sheer number of notifications she’s sent out. It’s like she really wants the whole world to know that she’s doing it.”

He looked at his watch, “Bring up the site.”

Sansa tapped on the notepad and sure enough, live on their screen, Daenerys Targaryen sat perched upon a beautifully upholstered armchair, impeccably dressed in a stylish business suit with her silver hair arranged in a tastefully messy braided updo. Her artfully painted lips smiled in greeting to those watching her broadcast.

_My name is Daenerys Targaryen, and I am President and Founder of Khaleesi Apparel & Cosmetics based in Meereen. I stream tonight live on the internet so that my story cannot be edited or skewed in any way by a news producer or reporter. This is my story. And I will tell it in my way. _

_A news program was recently widely aired in Westeros and some of the western free cities. A news program about the fall of my family business and then by extension, my family. I will not speak of business dealings, falsified reports, corrupt officials or hostile takeovers. Why would I? All of that happened before I was even born. Instead, I will tell you of my life._

_Lannister, Baratheon, Stark. These are the three names my brother Viserys told me to repeat when I woke in the morning and before I fell asleep at night. These were the names of the families I was told ruined our comfortable lives in Westeros and led us to live in squalor as penniless refugees in Essos. These families were my enemies._

_By the time I was fourteen, I believed it. And I was angry. I had basically been sold by my brother to a Dothraki gang leader as a child bride in exchange for protection, my brother had succumbed to the same madness that ruined my father, and I suffered a horrible miscarriage. I was ready to blame anyone that I could and seek revenge._

_But then I found myself in an adolescent group home in Pentos, and one day a man came in to see me. He had kind grey eyes and a Northern accent. He told me he had paid to have my brother transferred from the City Mental Asylum into the best long-term care facility in Essos. And he told me he had found me a comfortable home where I could live. I went into the care of a guardian in Pentos, a supportive and safe home where I found a wonderful father figure, another man from the North named Jorah Mormont, and wonderful siblings, other orphans named Missandei and Grey. To this day, the three of them are my dearest friends and closest advisors._

_The man who found me in the orphanage paid for my upkeep in Pentos, and when it was time, paid for me to attend the prestigious King’s Landing University where I gained the knowledge necessary to found and run my own successful company at only twenty-five years old._

_That man was Ned Stark._

_I do not know what happened before I was born. I do not know who was responsible for the downfall of my family’s business, or if it was always just destined to fall all on its own. Ned Stark very well could have been one of the people responsible—from experiencing the kind and honest character of this man first hand, I find that **very hard** to believe—but the fact is, I truly don’t know._

_What I truly_ **do** _know is that Ned Stark is the only one who tried to do right by me. He never asked for anything in return for his help and he never attempted to use his good deeds for good publicity. Even now, his defense of his own character does not include the way he bettered—or maybe even **saved** —my life. But **I will defend him with my story and my gratitude** —because he deserves it, because he has earned it, and I will not stand idly by and let his good character be defamed. _

_A Stark took me under his responsibility and care while a Baratheon and a Lannister both got obscenely rich and powerful on the ashes of my family business **and** my family, and then never thought of me again. _

_There are people who would ask you to look to the past and blame others for horrible events as a means of making themselves seem more honorable in the present._

_And then there are just people who are honorable in the present._

_I ask you, who is the first, and who is the second? Look at the characters of those involved, and don’t just believe a retelling of history that you know in your heart seems suspicious, simply because it’s on the television._

_Thank you for listening._

Jaime sat staring at the screen with his mouth open, finally gulping loudly when he turned to Sansa. She stared back at him with the same shock he felt.

“Well……… _HOLY FUCK_.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why yes, I did model Melisandre off of Miranda Priestly from The Devil Wears Prada, what of it?


	4. But in the End if I'm With You, I'll Take the Chance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, SUUUUUUPER long chapter, but this one ties up the loose ends. Gives them a happy ending. :)
> 
> And follow right after to the Epilogue...........

It all went down in only a span of two weeks.

Social media blew up after Daenerys’ livestream. #Nedisthesecondperson & #lookagain were all over the internet. 24hour-news channels replayed Dany’s video hourly, commentating and speculating, taking apart Baelish’s story piece by piece. Until eventually they saw it for the sham it was.

Even news commentators on Baelish’s own channel began to doubt. He was scheduled to have a live interview with the High Septon the next night, but the producers pulled his segment amidst the firestorm and the High Septon refused to reschedule with a ‘ _suspected fabricator’_.

Eventually, the producers and higher-ups at the news channel were forced to admit the story had only one source (a big _no-no_ in journalism) and retracted all claims made by the exposé, right before they suspended Petyr Baelish indefinitely from _Westeros Tonight_.

Varys Arachnias, Current Director of the National Financial Commission began an inquiry into suspected corrupt practices during The Targaryen Group NFC investigation twenty-five years ago.

Financial records from Casterly Enterprises, Storm’s End Inc, and the dusty remains of The Targaryen Group were subpoenaed, but they didn’t show much. (Any wrong-doings in the business records were covered up by a bevy of forensic accountants hired by Tywin Lannister years and years before.)

But evidence doesn’t only remain in financial records of huge corporations.

Twenty-five-years ago, right before her death, Ashara Dayne put $100,000 into a trust fund for her yet-to-be born niece or nephew. That child was Edric Dayne, and he came forward with the information included in his trust after he saw Daenerys’ livestream.

Included in the trust were two receipts, a certificate of appraisal, and a letter.

One receipt stated that Genna Lannister, sister of Tywin Lannister, bought a diamond necklace that had once belonged to Ashara’s mother. Genna bought the necklace for $50,000, even though the certificate of appraisal included in the trust’s documents clearly states the necklace was only worth $10,000.

Another receipt shows that Kevan Lannister, brother of Tywin, contracted with the construction company owned by Ashara’s brother-in-law Gerold, to replace all the plumbing in Kevan’s vacation home on the Westerlands coast. The receipt showed the job cost $60,000—but records provided by Gerold’s company show that Gerold was the only laborer listed on the job, no outside supplies were ordered for the job, and the job only took _one day_ …….despite the house being over 5000 square feet.

There was also the matter of the new owners of Kevan’s vacation home coming forward to state that after they bought the home, three years after the renovation supposedly took place, they had to replace all the plumbing, as it was old and rusty—and obviously had not been replaced.

It was all a smoke screen, designed to pay off Ashara Dayne. The money the Lannisters overpaid for the necklace and paid for the non-existent plumbing job added up to $100,000.

Then there was the letter, written on the night of Ashara Dayne’s death. The family was reluctant to release it, bringing hatred to Ashara’s memory and re-opening old wounds. But Ashara’s name was already being drug through the mud, might as well be for the correct reasons. A teary-eyed Allyria Dayne, sister of Ashara, read the letter aloud at a press conference. A troubled, stream-of-consciousness rambling of a woman on the edge:

“ _He told me I could do it for Elia. Get justice for Elia, make him pay, make them pay. He’s so powerful. They’re all right when they say that no one says no to him, no one walks away from him. But I didn’t know. I didn’t know it would do this. Elia wouldn’t want this. Ned was right, I shouldn’t have done this…… I’m sorry._ ”

The line in the letter about ‘ _no one says no to him, no one walks away from him’_ was something everyone knew was commonly said about Tywin Lannister. It was as if Ashara Dayne’s cremated remains were crawling out of the Summer Sea to point a finger at The Old Lion.

The statute of limitations to prosecute fraud cases had passed. There would be no prosecution of any wrong-doing. But that didn’t mean Tywin Lannister and Robert Baratheon walked away clean.

The press hated them. “Forget about the fraud case.” One news announcer stated. “Twelve people—not including Aerys, Rhaegar, and Rhaella Targaryen—committed suicide, were killed or died by exacerbated natural causes when The Targaryen Group imploded. Why is Tywin Lannister not being prosecuted for manslaughter?”

Business deals fell through. Contracts were voided. Charity Foundations found ways to remove them from their Boards of Directors.

And the best part—Ros Bianco, Madam to the best escort service in King’s Landing (who had been gifted the business when Sansa’s dear friend Shae decided to go straight and get a job at _The Red Lady_ magazine) came forward with both financial and photographic evidence of Robert Baratheon’s long-time and continued use of her prostitutes.

Moral of the story—don’t pay your prostitutes with personal checks and let them take pictures of you with them, naked and in bed.

Bye-Bye any chance of ever being Prime Minister. _Thank the gods._

Tywin Lannister would be transferring the headquarters of Casterly Enterprises to Astapor, a place with much looser morals than King’s Landing—if you can believe it.

And the world must have stopped turning as the Others descended upon the continents with an army of the dead, because something happened that no one ever dreamed—news organizations all over the world apologized to Eddard Stark, President and CEO of Stark Corporation.

 

 

 

The Lannisters were still filthy rich, but three days after Daenerys’ livestream. Jaime decided _he wasn’t_.

He took the gilded elevator up to the top floor of the Casterly Enterprises building, on the top of Visenya’s Hill, where it had stood for seventy years, looking down on _all the lowly subjects of King’s Landing_.

He marched past the secretary and entered Tywin’s office without permission or greeting, to find his father behind his desk. He had three letters in his hands.

Jaime began without preamble. “I’ve taken my name off the deed to the apartment. I’ll have vacated residence in seven days.”

Tywin sat back in his chair and put his hand to his chin. “Now, Jaime.”

“In addition, I’ve returned my car to the bank, where I’ve also removed myself from all the bank accounts in which I didn’t directly earn the money. Which is most of them.” He placed one letter down on the desk, then placed two others on either side. “Deed. Letter of Removal. And this is my letter of resignation from Casterly Enterprises.”

“As usual.” Tywin sighed disparagingly. “You’re overreacting.”

“No, I’m _finally_ acting.” Jaime stood up straighter, chin held high. “And it’s long overdue.”

Tywin stood from his chair. “This scandal will blow over. And you’re a Lannister!” He tapped his finger on the desk, on top of the letters. “I will not let you destroy our family by walking away! The Lannister Legacy I’ve built is too strong to be taken down by some—"

“YOU destroyed our family!” Jaime pointed a finger directly at his father’s face. “It’s bad enough you did what you did, maybe some part of me always knew you had. But then you try to pin it all on an innocent man! Just so you could protect Robert from scandal and make him _the worst Prime Minister in the history of Westeros!”_

“I will not explain the actions I’ve had to take to make this family gr—”

“I DON’T WANT TO BE YOUR SON ANYMORE!” Jaime carded his hands through his hair in frustration. “Can’t you understand that?! Go build your legacy with Cersei and Joffrey! It will crumble, for certain, but go ahead and build it anyway.” He shook his head wildly. “Tyrion cut the cord long ago, I don’t know what was keeping me here—probably the children. But Myrcella hasn’t looked back ever since she became Myrcella Martell and Tommen will be at school in Braavos next year,” Jaime pointed at Tywin again. “so, you’ll soon find you’ve lost them too.”

“I expected more from you.” Tywin replied, without emotion. “I’ve tried to give you every chance to become the person worthy of the title of my first-born son.” He sat back down in his chair and picked up his pen. “You’re a disappointment to me.”

Jaime laughed derisively. “So are you. I’ll always be a Lannister. But it will _my_ type of Lannister.” He walked to the door. “I won’t be yours…..I belong to someone else now.”

 

 

 

“JAIME?!” Sansa yelled, waving as soon as she saw him in the square.

Aegon’s Square, the most well-known, busiest place in all of King’s Landing. “Hey,” he grinned, standing up from a bench near the largest fountain. “thanks for coming.”

“Of course,” she smiled back, moving to stand in front of him. “but why didn’t you just wanna meet at your apartment?”

“Because I wanted to be _here,_ in the most visible place in the city.” He chuckled, putting an arm around her and pulling her close. “When I did _this_.”

And he put his lips to hers. Kissing her long and hard. And borderline pornographically. In front of the gods and everybody. He moved his arms under her ass and pulled her up into him, lifting her feet off the ground.

She reluctantly broke the kiss to look down at his face, laughing softly with her arms around his neck. “ _Jaime_.”

He lifted a hand to her cheek. “I took myself off the deed to the apartment, I’ll have to be out of there by the end of the week. Gave up access to all the Lannister accounts. Took the subway here because I gave my car back to Caster Bank.” He put her back on the ground and opened his arms wide. “I’m still Jaime Lannister, but now I’m just yours.”

“No, Jaime.” She leaned into his chest and nuzzled her face into his neck. “Now you’re finally _yours_.”

 

 

 

Jaime stood before the large gilded mirror that had always been on the long wall by his front door, looking to the lighted sconce above it and running the silky rope through his fingers.

“You’re sure about this?” He yelled out to her.

“Of course,” she yelled back from the bedroom. “I’ve always loved that mirror, walked past it enough. And it’s going to have to stay here in the apartment, so this will be our last chance. Time to live out some crazy fantasies……if you’re having second thoughts—”

“No!” He interjected strongly, immediately. “I really, _really_ want to. But…….”

“It’s silky rope from the craft store, Jaime,” She responded soothingly, but with a teasing lilt to her voice. “It’ll be loosely looped through a light fixture. It’s not exactly hard bondage. You won’t hurt me.”

Jaime let out a small, breathy chuckle and leaned up to loop the rope through the wall sconce. “Then get out here, already—so I can tie you up, Ms. Stark.”

Jaime wasn’t really into lingerie. Especially with Sansa. Why would you cover up any of the perfection that was Sansa Stark’s naked body—hot and ready for you. Even if it was the finest material in the best design, it still could never compete with her.

But Sansa had insisted the lingerie was necessary—this time was about teasing, tantalizing. About revealing what was underneath when the time was right. And looking at her as she walked out of his bedroom, Jaime found it hard to disagree.

It was all black. Black patent High Sparrow four-inch heels. Black lace stockings connected to black garters. A tiny lace skirt hanging off her hips. No panties—she had at least conceded that would be pointless. And a structureless bralette of the same black lace loosely covering her breasts. “Gods have mercy.” He said under his breath.

But he would have to say the best thing about her walking toward him, was her fingers tracing over the snowflake pendant hanging from her neck and her teeth shyly biting her lip. She twirled for him.

“Tie me up, Mr. Lannister.” She walked up before him, running a hand over his chest and tracing the buttons on his white dress shirt. “You sure you don’t wanna be undressed?”

He nodded. “Just you.” He groaned deep in his throat as she turned from him to face the mirror, held her hands above her head and arched her back slightly so her ass was nestled in his groin. “Umm, you’re so bad, baby. Teasing me like this.” Both arms reached up, boxing her in with his body, and put her hands near the top of the mirror. He took the silky rope hanging from the sconce and looped it completely over her clasped hands, tying them all together with a loose knot. He motioned for her to tug on her hands once they were firmly attached to the sconce. And when she did, she let out a deep, stuttering moan indicating she felt safe, right, and excited. “Oh, fuck, but you’re also _so good_ , Sansa baby.”

“I can be both for you.” She moaned, eyes closed and teeth biting into lip so hard she worried she might bleed. “You’re the first person I’ve ever felt like I could be both.”

“You always have such smooth, creamy, ivory skin.” He scraped his teeth along her shoulder and ran a hand along the curve of her ass to lift her lace skirt, revealing said skin. “Does it take too much to make it pearly and pink?” He bit down on the shoulder, simultaneously smacking the bare ass with his large hand.

“FUCK, _Jaime_.” She breathed out deeply and in ecstasy. “Keep going, please.”

He lowered the zipper of his pants, pulling out his rock-hard cock and rubbing it against the curve of her ass. “You feel this? You don’t even have to do anything to make me want you. But when you _try_? _Fuck_ , when you actually make an effort to make me hot for you? So wholly unnecessary, but so singularly wonderful.”

“Well, baby.” She exhaled long and low, with a slight laugh. “You’re worth going the extra mile.”

His thumb took the moisture from the tip of his practically purple cock, spreading it around his length. Then sliding fingers between her legs to check her wetness, he slipped his cock against the inside of her thighs and the outside of her pussy. He groaned at the sweet friction. “Baby, it’s like I can hardly stand to not be inside you…..your mouth, your cunt. Or sliding myself against you…. like I am now, that _glorious_ time between your tits.”

“You do seem to love my tits.”

“How could I not?” His free hand reached around her, easily pushing up the lace bralette to grasp one in his rough hand and making her moan, then making her gasp as he thumbed across her nipple. “Perfect fit for my hand. Soft and yet somehow firm, heavy and yet somehow pert.”

She giggled softly, whimpering in the back of her throat. “ _Do you_ love me for _just_ for my tits?”

He emphatically shook his head. “I love you because you’re _you_.” He nuzzled behind her ear, and tugged her lobe with light teeth. “I love you because you love me.”

“I do, I love you so much.” She pushed her forehead against the mirror. “Touch my pussy, Jaime, _please_.”

“Talk about a part of you that’s perfection.” He reached around the front of her, moving up the tiny lace skirt to bare her to the sight of him in the mirror and sliding an index finger inside as his thumb stroked against her throbbing clit. “You’re so wet, your perfect cunt’s so wet.” He moved her legs further apart with his knees. “Can I be inside you?”

“Gods, yes!” She gasped, clenching her eyes shut as he took himself in hand and easily slammed inside her soaked pussy. “Ugh, yes. Ugh, gods…yes, Jaime. I love your cock, _so_ much.”

“Gods, yes.” He stroked a strong hand up, down and all around her back and shoulders, his lips sucking the curve of her ear and lobe, as he began to thrust deep inside her. “San.”

“ _Jaime_ , Jaime, you’re so deep.” She stared straight into his eyes in the mirror, just into his eyes and nowhere else. But that just wouldn’t do.

He reached up to grasp her hair, gently pushing her face down to where she had no choice but to look at her body. “Look at yourself like this, gods. You finally get to see what I see, San. You’re so beautiful every moment of your life, but when I’m moving inside you, when I’m making you feel good, the kind of good that only I can make you feel?” He turned her face to claim her lips in a scorching kiss. “You’re so fucking perfect I can hardly stand it.”  

“Jaime, you’re so beautiful too. When you’re inside me, so fierce, so determined, and then when you come…….” Her eyes moved, as instructed, up and down her flushed, writhing, sweat-drenched body, and he could feel her pussy contract with being turned on by the sight of it. But then she met his eyes again—her look so beyond determined it nearly took his breath away, and he couldn’t fight it.

“I don’t know what glitch in the universe accidently brought you to me, or what forgotten miraculous good deed I’ve done in the past that I’m being rewarded for now—I don’t fucking care.” His thumb on her clit went from gently stroking to furiously rubbing. “You’re _mine_ , and I’m the luckiest son-of-a-bitch that ever lived.”

“Uhh….Jaime!” She pressed her ass further into him, making him groan, as her eyes nearly bore holes in the mirror as she stared back at him. “Baby, I’m gonna come. I want it, want you, want your come, please come, please come for me.”

“San, yes, _take it_.” His mouth dropped open as he saw her come, her eyes slamming shut and a scream leaving her raw throat, her pussy clenching hard around his cock. He pushed through her tightness, still pounding into her fiercely, until he felt a deep rolling turn over in his lower belly and his balls tightened. He pressed himself deeper into her, his groin against her ass and chest pressed flush against her back as he came, ferociously wailing into the soft, damp skin of her neck.

He came back to himself with the sound of her musical laughter floating to his ears and he lifted his head to find her beautiful face in the mirror, slyly asking, “Actually, is there any way we _could_ take this mirror with us?”

 

 

 

“Hey there, Mr. Lannister!” Margaery greeted cheerily as she opened the front door of the apartment.

“Margaery.” Jaime smiled and nodded as he came through the door, holding cardboard boxes stacked up to his chin. “I think you can call me _Jaime_ now.”

“Oh yeah,” she playfully winked as she took the top box from him. “I guess you screwing my roommate and moving in with us means I can drop the formalities my Septa taught me.”

“Margaery!” Sansa shrilled, putting two cold soda cans down on the coffee table before returning to the kitchen.

“Oh, what?” She shouted back as she put her box on the sofa. “I’m gonna be an old married woman soon, the only joy I’ll have in life will be shocking other’s sensibilities.”

“Well,” he smirked back at her, depositing his other boxes on the floor. “It’s takes more than that to shock me, so you’re out of luck.”

“Uh-huh.” Margaery shrugged a shoulder, as she turned to join Sansa in the kitchen. “Wasn’t my best effort. I must be getting rusty in my couple-hood.”

Jaime took her arm to stop her. “But you’re _happy_ , right? Even if you’re not who you were as a thriving single?” He ducked his head toward Margaery, so Sansa wouldn’t hear. “Do you think in choosing to spend her life with an old man, with me, that Sansa might ever feel she’s missing out on—”

Margaery stopped him by patting his back sharply. “You’re not old. And falling in love and wanting to spend the rest of your life with someone, doesn’t make you _less than_ —it makes you _more than_.” She nodded to the kitchen, taking both soda cans off the table and handing him his. “I’ve never seen Sansa this ‘ _more than’_ in the whole time I’ve known her. Especially since you guys stopped pussy-footing around with being open about your relationship.”

“Okay, then.” He breathed a huge sigh of relief, smiling in gratitude as they both opened their cans and raised them in salute.

Sansa came into the room then and stopped next to Jaime, putting her hand on his chest and kissing his chin. Lifting a brow at Margaery.

“Just don’t use up all the hot water in the morning, and you two will be fine.” Margaery took a huge gulp. “I’ve shared a bathroom with her for six years—she’s a real bitch about that.”

 

 

 

They laid boneless and sated in her bed, him spooned up behind her, knees tucked into hers, and breath sweet against the back of her neck as his fingers danced slowly and repeatedly from the curve of her shoulder down to the curve of her hip.

“Thanks for letting me shack up with you.”

She took the hand of the arm that pillowed her head and kissed the palm. “I’m sorry you lost your apartment.”

“Fuck it. I only liked that apartment when you were in it. The rest of the time, it was just _cold_ —glass, steel, and granite. Filled with pretentious items Cersei decided should be in it because a Lannister would be living there.” He put his arm around her waist and pulled her in closer. “I’d look out that wall of windows onto the city and wonder about the people in the apartments below; did they have husbands, wives, families? Did they look up at my windows and my building and wish they could live there just because it was a luxury high-rise? Not knowing I was wishing I could be somewhere else?”

She sighed and sidled her ass deep into his groin. “I’ll miss your bathtub, at least…or should I say the small granite lap-pool in your bathroom masquerading as a bathtub.”

He laughed, the rumble of it felt against her back, and sucked her earlobe into his mouth. “And I’ll miss you _in_ my bathtub. Although….you never did get terribly clean.”

 

 

 

“Hurry,” Jaime raced down the sidewalk, brisk air slightly pinking up his cheeks. “hurry, Sansa.”

She laughed breathily. “Jaime, I know I’m wearing boots, but they’re _high-heeled_ boots.”

“I know,” he tugged on her hand. “I’m just worried if we don’t get there in time it might be clos—” He came upon the gates of the park on the edge of Blackwater Bay he’d been running to since they left her apartment. His eyes had burst open this morning with an idea and it wouldn’t let up until they were there.

But what he found when he came up to the gates was not what he wanted to see. The seasonal ice skating rink was closed to skaters. Jaime yanked repeatedly on the metal gates.

A park employee heard the sound and came over. He sadly pressed his lips in a thin line. “Sorry, folks. Rink’s closed. Temps not low enough.”

Jaime groaned, looking to the sky. “Ahh, come on! It’s the middle of winter!”

“And this is King’s Landing, not White Harbor.” The man chuckled. “Ice wouldn’t hold up under the blades and the weight of the skaters—too dangerous!”

Jaime backed off and smiled apologetically, waving a grateful hand and turning to Sansa. “Damn. I was hoping that if we got here before ten a.m. the chill from the night wouldn’t have melted off.” He sat on a nearby bench, deflated. “I’m sorry, baby.”

Sansa sat beside him, a sympathetic look on her face. “We can try again tonight.”

“Nah.” He shook his head in defeat. “This evening is supposed to be warm—weatherman’s even acting like it’s a good thing.”

“Well it is……..” she teased, laying her head on his shoulder. “to all you southroners who can’t handle the slightest frost.”

He pointed to a nearby cart along the park path. “Do you wanna get a hot chocolate?”

“I was actually thinking it’s hot enough to take off my jacket,” she laughed, taking off the garment. “so _no_ to the hot chocolate _._ ”

He shrugged, a smile tugging his lips. “I was hoping to do something to take your mind off everything.”

“And it worked.” She leaned in to give a small kiss. “It was a real nice thing to do. Do you know how to skate?”

He chuckled and shook his head. “I was just gonna watch you.”

“Well, that won’t work at all. For me, skating’s no fun unless someone’s with you. I’ll have to teach you.”

“Teach me the piano, teach me to skate, I think you’re assuming I’m easy to teach.” His chest rumbled with laughter. “And that would be a false assumption.”

She laughed along with him, knowing it was the truth. “I remember back home, the inside rink was mainly used for hockey. So, all the recreational skaters went to Reed Lake—it was frozen enough for skaters ten months out of the year.” She smiled wistfully. “During the two months it wasn’t frozen over, the very, very brave would swim in it while people off on the shore would laugh at them hysterically.”

“I’m guessing even during those two months Reed Lake was still pretty damn cold?”

“Very chilly.” She nodded as she twisted to face him. “I only tried swimming once, only stayed in the water for maybe a minute. Then sat myself down in front of the fireplace for the rest of the day and night.”

“Still,” he rubbed his palms on her upper arms. “I’m proud of my girl for trying.”

“We’d all go to Reed Lake every Saturday morning to skate.” Sansa took Jaime’s hand and brought it to her lap, excited like a small child. “And then the weeks we were out of school, we’d go _every_ morning. Dad would take us when we were little. And there was a woman, Old Nan, and her son Wylis, who ran the food cart next to the lake.” She turned her head to look at the cart along the path. “Mom would tell us not to get anything—it was all terribly un-nutritious food like hot chocolate and funnel cakes with powdered sugar and drizzled chocolate—”

“Baked apples?” He interjected hopefully.

“Mmmm.” She licked her lips. “But Dad would always take us to the cart anyway after we were done skating.” She bit her lip and her eyelids fluttered shut, remembering. “And when he paid Wylis for our food, he’d always turn to us and put his finger to his lips and say, ‘ _our secret’_. We’d sit at the tables and we’d all talk about our week. Mom always knew more about our lives because she was at home while Dad worked…..but he’d try to catch up with us those mornings—you could always tell he cared.”

“A dad who cared.” Jaime shrugged self-deprecatingly. “There’s a strange concept.”

“He would always take us on Saturdays, but on the other mornings when we were out of school, Robb would take us—either by bus or in his classic car that he and Jon had restored together when he got old enough to drive. And still Mom would always remind us not to get anything at Old Nan’s, and still without fail, Robb would find $5 and a note that said, ‘ _our secret_ ’ in his pocket. When Robb went off to college and I was the one to take my siblings to the lake, I would find the _same note_ in my purse, and $10.”

“Price of inflation?” He laughed with a quirked brow.

“And more siblings.” She laughed back, before slowly sobering and gazing up to the sky. “Old Nan died last year. Businesses in Winterfell shut down on the day of her funeral because three-fourths of the town was in attendance.”

“The cart still in operation?”

Sansa nodded happily. “Bran’s girlfriend, Meera Reed—the lake is named after her family, actually—helps Wylis run the cart.”

Jaime took a deep breath. “You miss Winterfell?”

She nodded without hesitation, looking out onto Blackwater Bay. “I was so excited to come to King’s Landing for school. And loved every second of my classes and being here with my friends.” She looked to her lap. “But there wasn’t a day where at some point in my waking hours, I didn’t miss Winterfell and my family so much it took my breath away.”

“Why didn’t you go back when you graduated?” He reached up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear.

“I convinced myself it wasn’t what I wanted. My degree and my fancy education made me a big girl, I’d stay in the big city and get everything I wanted.” Sansa sighed heavily. “But now I’ve had people tell me that in order to get what I wanted, I’d have to do unsavory things, things I’ll _never_ want to do—so now what I thought I wanted, I want a little less each day.”

“So…….” he ducked his head to catch her gaze and grinned. “………want _something new_. There’s no shame in that.”

“I guess.” She looked up. “I’m starting to see it now that it’s just me in this apartment…….well, me _and you_ —”

He held up his hands playfully. “—Hey, I’m just a squatter.”

“I do feel like I’m the last holdout, you know? The last soldier left in the abandoned fort.” She began to fiddle with the buttons on her blouse. “Hanging on by my fingernails to this life, when in reality, it was always a life I needed to leave behind. In my world of people, King’s Landing was the place you came to grow….to learn…..to make friends…..to find out who you really are.” She shrugged, almost in acceptance. “But in the end, everyone migrates, goes off to live their lives in other places. And you _don’t stay_ —because if you stay in King’s Landing, King’s Landing changes you. It’s the cost of residency here.” She leaned into him and kissed his cheek. “And I don’t wanna change. I like who I am.”

He rubbed her back. “I like who you are, too.”

“But am I the type of person who gives up and runs home?” She pulled back and furrowed her brow. “I don’t know that wanna be that person, either.”

He cupped her cheek. “I think you’d be giving up and running home if you lived in your parent’s basement while you played video games, ate frozen pizza and masturbated looking at porn on your laptop all day.” He paused as she snorted out a laugh. “But that’s not you. And if I’d lived in a place like Winterfell growing up, and had a family like yours…….

“I’m sorry you didn’t.” She pressed her forehead to his.

“Me too.” He nodded regretfully. “But just because you move on from childhood, doesn’t mean you have to move out of town.”

 

 

 

“I found out my car got vandalized this morning.” He said nonchalantly, reaching for the remote and flipping through the channels.

She sat up from where she been laying on his chest, lifting a brow. “You don’t have a car anymore.”

“Yeah.” He chuckled, laying his head back on the couch cushions. “little did the vandals know that Caster Bank took it back when I told them I was stopping payments.” He chuckled again, shrugging slightly. “Now Dad’s bank has a trashed car. Just desserts all around, I guess.”

She reached up and ran a hand across his stubbly jaw.

He took the hand and laid a kiss in her palm. “Right now, this country—and especially this town—hates all Lannisters.”

“Even the Lannisters who hate the Lannisters as much as the town does?” She tried for a twinkle in her eye, not quite succeeding.

He nodded, wincing slightly. “For the foreseeable future, King’s Landing won’t be the most pleasant place for me.”

“Kind of sucks how the haters just switched from me to you.” She laid against his chest and wrapped her arms around his waist. “They should learn their lesson and not blame people for troubles they had no hand in.”

“People never learn their lesson from a situation unless it happens directly to them.” He ran his fingers through her hair.

“Guess not.” She looked up at his face, sadness and doubt bleeding out from the blue of her eyes. “Revenge is still a tempting morsel. I phoned a few contacts I made while working at the magazine, hoping to feel around for job prospects. None of them took my call.”

He traced a finger along her bottom lip. “People may hate Melisandre, but her reach is still far. You may have burned a few bridges when you left _The Red Lady_.”

“You mean telling Melisandre St. Rhllor to go fuck herself may have been bad for my career?” She snorted sarcastically. “If the situation where the same, I’d burn that bridge all over again.” She danced her fingers up his chest to lightly tap his chin. “I may just have to suck it up and scrape the bottom of the publishing-world barrel until that flame dies down. At least in terms of the literary world—King’s Landing is still the place to be. Publications and publishing houses up and down Paper Street.”

“Maybe it’s the editorial capitol of Westeros,” he kissed her forehead. “but it’s not the only place to be a writer.”

“Highgarden has a few places,” she sighed, clearly not enthused. “though they’re mostly high-gloss fashion and interior design publications. There’s Oldtown and the Citadel—they always need textbooks and reference sources.”

“So, it’s superficial fluff magazines women peruse while taking a bubble bath or school books college kids fall asleep reading?” He shook his head, agreeing with her reluctance. “Neither sound like you.”

“There’s always Braavos.” Her eyes lit up, but only a tiny bit. “Or any of the other free cities….you were happy there, weren’t you?”

He sat up from the cushions, pulling her with him, and began carefully. “Yeah, as a young, single guy. But none of them are places I’d wanna be with a……..” he trailed off when he saw her eyebrows lift in surprise. He ducked his head down and kissed her shoulder. “with a wife. With children.”

Her eyes glassed over with tears, and a bright smile graced her face. “Jaime, Jaime Lannister.”

“You have to know that’s where I was headed with this. I burnt down my old family—Father, Cersei, Robert, Joffrey—and it needed to be done, that old family was a creepy haunted house with a caved in roof and a rat nest in the basement, on the edge of a graveyard that kids were afraid to go near.” He paused while she broke into laughter, head falling on his chest. “But now I want a new family, with the old people I’ve always loved, and the new people I’m now free to love. And you’re the only person I’ve ever wanted that with. I want you, _badly_ …….so much it’s all-consuming. But that’s not where it ends—I want to have things _with you_ —a life, a home, and a family.”

She carded her fingers through his hair, nails scratching his scalp, listening to him purr like a kitten at the action. “And _you_ have to know where _I’m_ headed with this.” She placed a light kiss on his lips. “Anywhere you are.”

He ran his hands softly down her sides, pointedly not looking at her. “I’ll miss you while you’re gone home to Winterfell for Winter Solstice the day after tomorrow.”

“It’s only three days.” She made him look right out her, smiling encouragingly. “And you’ll be in Sunspear tomorrow, right?”

“Yeah, but only for the night.” He nodded, a long exhale escaping his lungs. “Tommen’s been at Myrcella and Trystane’s place so he could go to the shore these last few days. I decided to wait until the end of their vacation to surprise them—well, surprise is kind of a bad word.” He cradled his forehead in his palm. “I didn’t want them to have their beach holiday ruined by their decrepit old uncle telling them he’d been…… well, _you know_.”

“Yeah, _I know_.” She cocked her head to the side, a crooked smile on her lips in an attempt to lighten the mood. “Maybe to make it easier for them to swallow, you don’t refer to yourself as _decrepit and old_ when you tell them you’re in a relationship with me?”

“Good idea.” He gave a shaky laugh, looking away. “But I need to tell them, and it’ll probably go better if they’re together when I do.”

She inhaled sharply. “Are you sure you don’t want me to tell my family about us while I’m back home?”

“No.” He replied firmly, rubbing her upper arms. “It’s one thing to tell two relatives under twenty-five years old about us. But to tell _parents_?” He blew out a breath. “When we finally tell them about us, they’re going to have questions about our future.” He kissed her hairline and took his hand in hers. “And I want us to have better answers for them than ‘ _both unemployed, fucking twelve hours a day, and only getting out of bed to eat cheap Qartheen food and go to the winter park to attempt to ice skate_.’

She looked away from him, disappointed. “So, I guess I won’t tell them.”

“Hey, it won’t be long…..it _can’t be_. I’ll die if I can’t be honest about it soon.” He pulled her face back to his and kissed her eyelids, then her nose, then her lips. “When I pick you up at the airport after your flight back here from Winterfell, there will be a plan for us, and then _they’ll know_. I promise.”

 

 

 

Jaime had already left for Sunspear that morning and Sansa was packing up her suitcase to get ready to leave for Winterfell, when her phone rang.

_Holy fuck. It’s Myrcella. Jaime must have already told her. Do I answer the phone? I guess I’ll know how it went based on whether she starts screaming at me as soon as I answer._

“Hi.” Sansa barely whispered into the phone.

There was a long pause, and Sansa found herself thinking the worst, until she heard Myrcella exhale and speak.

“I felt like I needed to call….and apologize.”

“Oh my gods, ‘Cella,” Sansa stuttered. “for what?”

“My family has made your family’s life a living hell in recent memory,” Myrcella almost sounded on the verge of tears. “all the worse that you got blamed for something we did, and I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”

“Myrcella, your family is Tommen, and Trystane, and Tyrion, and Jaime.” Sansa started firmly. “None of you have ever done anything to me or my family besides be kind and decent.” She laughed breathily. “You’ve absolutely reason to owe me an apology.”

“Well,” Myrcella let out a relieved breath. “I just felt we should talk.”

“I’m glad.” Sansa practically giggled, feeling relieved and light-hearted. “So, things went well with Jaime?”

There was a long silence before Myrcella’s confused voice came over the line. “Jaime?”

_Well, shit. I just blew it all to hell._

“Yeah.” Sansa began, her voice breaking, even as she tried to hold onto the hope that Jaime really was there and had already spoken to Myrcella. “He’s there with you…… _isn’t he_?”

“No.” Myrcella replied. And Sansa’s heart dropped into her stomach. She heard the pitch of Myrcella’s voice drop slightly, “Why would he be here?”

“Um,” Sansa’s voice and hands trembled. “He knew that Tommen was visiting you in Sunspear and decided to make the trip to surprise you both.”

“Well, that’s great……..” Myrcella was almost happy for a brief moment. Then there was a long pause where Sansa could hear Myrcella’s shallow breathing. “How would _you_ know that?”

Sansa clenched her eyes shut and just replied without thought as her mind reeled. “He needed to talk to the two of you about something….. _delicate_.” Sansa put a hand on her chest, foolishly hoping that would quell her pounding heart. “And……thought it would be best if he did it while you were together.”

“Talk to us about what?” Myrcella’s voice caught in the back of her throat. “Sansa, how did you know ……..?”

“Damn it.” A tear that Myrcella couldn’t see snuck out the corner of Sansa’s eye. “Cella………there’s something you need to know.”

As she was speaking the words, she felt her stomach drop in fear, but a strange weight lift off her chest in relief at her confession. But as time passed, moment by moment, she grew deeply concerned with the fact there was complete silence on the other end. And the longer the silence lasted, the less relief she felt in speaking the truth.

“Myrcella?” Sansa finally whispered. “Say something.”

“I can’t talk to you.” Came the response.

“Myrcella, please.”

“No, I can’t talk to you.” Myrcella’s voice rose, nearly shouting. “Do you understand what happens now? Now I have to sit in my living room—three months _pregnant_ , by the way. I was also calling to tell you _that joyful news….”_ Sansa hunched over herself in guilt at hearing Myrcella say those words. “…….and wait with my brother for my uncle—who’s been _more of a father_ to me than my _actual father_ —to ‘ _surprise me’_ with the news he’s been fucking one of my best friends behind my back! I can’t talk to you!”

“Fine. Myrcella that’s fine.” Sansa tried speaking softly, soothingly. “I understand. You’re hurt, you’re mad at me. You don’t want to talk to me right now, I get it. And if you don’t want to talk to me ever again, I get that too. It would hurt, so much, if you did that, to not have you in my life,……. _but I get it_.” She breathed deep and started pleading, “But you can’t do that to Jaime. To not have you in his life? It would _kill him_. He loves you so much.”

Myrcella scoffs harshly. “Just not enough to stop himself from seducing my best friend.”

“Myrcella.” Sansa gripped the phone, her head hanging low. “There was no seducing, on either of our parts. If you don’t believe anything else I say, believe that. It was the both of us feeling something we couldn’t stop.” She began to speak wistfully, remembering the strongest feelings she’d ever felt in her life. “If there had been seducing, I’d regret the relationship—but I don’t, I never could, never will. I regret that it’s causing you pain right now, so much, ‘Cella.” Sansa cried truthfully. “But I can’t regret something in my life that makes me so happy.”

There was a distant chime, and Myrcella let out an angry chuckle. “That’s the doorbell. I _wonder who_ it could be?”

 

 

 

Three hours later, Sansa was sitting in the corner of her room, with her back against the wall and her legs hugged to her chest. She laid her head on her knees and watched the shafts of sunlight from the window travel across the hardwood floor.

She was startled out of her trance by the ringing of her phone. _Myrcella again_. Sansa almost didn’t want to answer. But she loved her friend, and she would to listen to Myrcella yell at her more—hours more, days more—if it meant Myrcella was still speaking to her.

“Myrcella?”

There was another long silence. “I still think it’s strange. Probably always will.” Myrcella huffed, begrudgingly, but truthfully. “But he says….he says he’s _happy_. That _he loves you, and he’s happy_ , and you’re good to him.” Her voice waivered. “And you, Sansa? Is he—"

Sansa laughed with such relief. “Oh gods, _yes_ , Myrcella. He’s so good to me. I’ve never been happy like this, didn’t really know you could. The only thing that brought us any sadness was knowing we weren’t being honest about it. But I……I love him, too.”

“Uncle Jaime’s never had someone to take care of him. He’s always been the one to take care of everybody else.” Myrcella paused, and in just that space of time, her anger had seemed to seep away by the bucketsful. “He seemed _different_ this visit—almost younger…freer, I guess. I’ve always wanted that for him, to have someone who takes care of him.” She chuckled lowly. “It’s funny, even though I’m kinda weirded out by the thought, when I think about it……..you do fit the bill…….of being what he needs.”

 

 

 

Winter Solstice was the biggest, most festive day of the year in the Stark household. Unwrapping gifts before a roaring fireplace; all manner of jubilant, snowy, outdoor games involving the whole family; and then of course, the biggest family feast most had ever seen: Honeyed chickens, meat pies, roasted lamb. Potatoes, rice, corn, roasted vegetables. Pies, cakes, puddings.

They all sat around the oak table that Uncle Benjen had gifted Ned and Catelyn for their wedding. It was covered in a white table cloth, with weirwood branches decorating down the middle and lit candles placed inside their holes and knobs. It sat the Stark Patriarch and Matriarch, Robb, Margaery, Jon, Daenerys, Arya, Gendry, Bran, Meera, Rickon—who even he had a female friend visiting from boarding school in Skagos. The only person without a partner was Sansa. Technically—and only in terms of the family table. The odd person out.

They sat down to eat at one p.m. and were still going strong at three p.m., mostly because they did more talking than they did eating.

“Margaery,” Catelyn began, passing the potatoes down to the eagerly waiting Rickon. “Your grandmother called me the other day.”

“Oh, gods,” Margaery groaned lightly, dropping her fork down to her plate. “what did she say to offend you?” The whole table burst into laughter at the assessment of the Queen of Thorns.

“Oh, hush.” Catelyn waved a hand, laughing too. “She was perfectly lovely. Just talking details; dress, cake, flowers.” She cocked her head to the side, pressing her lips together. “Aside from asking me to talk you out of your desire to have your wedding in this ‘frozen wasteland’ where I’ve lived and loved for thirty years, it was perfectly nice.”

“That’s Olenna for you.” Daenerys chimed in good-naturedly. “After four years of living with her granddaughter, she got in a few barbs at my expense, but she never meant harm.”

“That’s right.” Catelyn nodded, looking down to Margaery. “No harm intended, none done.”

“While we’re on the subject of getting phone calls we’d never expected—” Ned lowered his fork and brought his fingers beneath his chin in a temple. “Jaime Lannister called me and inquired about a job either with Stark Corp or with the Foundation, here in Winterfell.”

The whole room erupted into chaos, the dozen Starks and assorted partners talking over each other. The only people who weren’t talking were Ned, sitting calmly at the head of the table while the others shouted; Margaery, her doe eyes wider than Sansa had ever seen as she attempted not to look Sansa’s way; and Sansa herself, practically frozen with her fork halfway between the plate and her mouth.

“Okay, that’s enough.” Ned put up his hands to shush them.

“Ned, are you actually considering it?” Catelyn’s mouth hung open in an un-ladylike show of disbelief.

“Yes.” Ned nodded seriously, taking a slow sip of his cider. “He’s cut all ties with Casterly—”

“So, he cut out on his family because he didn’t wanna be dragged down with them.” Robb scoffed from down the table, not quite buying it. “That’s _big of him_.”

“We could actually use his expertise, Son” Ned responded calmly. “It was a waste, when Casterly put him in Security Services. True, he was a soldier in the Royal Guard, but he was in their engineering and logistics corps.” Ned began, cutting into his roast lamb and bringing a bite onto his fork. “He oversaw the building of infrastructure—roads, sewers, bridges—in all sorts of places. Poor, rural or war-torn places. He was a part of the force that set up the new electrical grid over in Vaes Dothrak.”

Jon took over the pro-hiring-Jaime-Lannister debate while Ned chewed his bite. “We could use somebody like that when the Lyanna Memorial Foundation starts the restructuring of the water system in Hardhome.”

“He’s a Lannister!” Arya shouted, as if that was all she’d need to say.

“Babe.” Gendry touched her hand, soothing but disagreeing. “Jaime’s not like Tywin or Cersei. When I finally met my d—well, when I met _Robert_ …..we had drinks a few times, but then after a while, it became clear Robert wasn’t gonna claim me or have anything to do with me. Eventually, a phone call came from some lackey at Storm’s End Inc and it said Robert was an important man, couldn’t have this associated with his image……and so on…..and so on.” He shrugged, lifting both brows. “Then one day, I’m working in the old shop on Steel Street and Jaime Lannister comes in. He talks to me, asks if I’m okay—then gives me check for $500,000.”

“So…… he _bought you off_!?” Robb shouted from across the table, clearly offended by this break of moral standard. Margaery placed a hand on his arm to try and calm him.

“No.” Gendry shook his head firmly. “I know it could come off looking like that, but it didn’t feel like that, man. He spoke to me for almost an hour—about fathers that let you down, about how sometimes it’s best to be rid of them—and gave me his phone number, telling me to call if I needed anything.” He shrugged, an honest look on his face. “I got the feeling that he really cared, really wanted to make sure I’d be okay, even if Robert _had_ cast me aside.”

“I hope you tore up the check….” Arya sneered, reaching over him to get the basket of rolls.

“No.” Gendry shook his head without apology. “How do you think I bought the metal shop?”

“The shop I work in?” Arya cringed, dropping the roll in shock. “Now it’s tainted by Lannister money.”

“ _Jaime_ Lannister money, babe.” Gendry rubbed her back. “It’s not the same thing. He’s not the same as the monsters on Casterly Enterprises top floor.”

Shouts of disagreement filled the dining room. Echoes reminding what the Lannisters did to the Targaryens, what they almost did to the people sitting at the table. Yells of ‘ _we can’t trust him’_ , countered with ‘ _you don’t know that, you don’t know him’._ But never at any time did Sansa open her mouth. Never at any time did her heart beat.

“That’s _enough_!” Ned’s voice cut through the din again, still even, but a little more forceful than the last time. “I know this is hard to believe, but Jaime Lannister actually helped me during the Baelish exposé troubles.”

“What?” Sansa spoke for the first time. A clearly confused, but elated expression lighting up her face. _Jaime?_ She reverently touched the snowflake pendant on her neck. “Dad…..he did?” Her mouth fluttered open and closed “How….how?”

“He came up here to Winterfell.” Ned gave a slight smile in Sansa’s direction. “Really just told me things I already knew. But got me to realize something needed to be done, more than I’d been doing.” He looked down the table to Dany. “Turns out I didn’t have to do what I’d planned, thanks to the lovely Daenerys and her livestreaming antics.” Ned paused to give a toothy grin as Daenerys turned bright red in embarrassment. “But still, he didn’t have to try and help me. He could’ve just stayed there in King’s Landing.” He brought a hand to his forehead. “He could have….let me rot…let us be picked apart…...”

“Ned, why in the world would Jaime Lannister—?” Catelyn began to ask, thankfully stopping Ned’s train of thought.

“He’s a good guy.” Margaery interjected, looking to everyone at the table except for Sansa. “Always treated us well whenever he came to see Myrcella.”

“I agree.” Dany added, nodding honestly. “Myrcella loves him like crazy. So, I guess that means he’s aces in my book.”

There was a long silence that hung in the air until Bran hummed lowly. “I guess you never really know.”

“So, you’re really gonna offer him a job?” Robb asked, still sounding skeptical, but trying to be open as Margaery leaned beside him to hook her arm around his.

“I am.” Ned answered authoritatively. “And if he comes up here, we’ll give him the benefit of the doubt. If he works for Stark Corp, or the Foundation—we’ll treat him accordingly.” Ned caught Sansa’s eyes, a soft, accepting twinkle in his. “He’ll be one of us.” He looked around to everyone at the table. “Understood?”

Some were firm, some were begrudging, but all present at the table agreed with a chorus of, “Understood.”

Sansa’s smile lit up the room, and suddenly she didn’t feel like the odd person out.

 

 

Dany caught up with Sansa as she walked through the foyer to the staircase, hooking her arm with Sansa’s and leaning in close to her side. “So…… you and Jaime Lannister, huh?”

“Oh, my gods!” Sansa’s face froze, and she pulled on Dany’s arm to drag her into the nearby powder room. “Margaery wasn’t supposed to tell anybody that! If that got out before—”

“Relax!” Daenerys chuckled at Sansa’s distress as shut the door behind them. “Margaery didn’t tell me.”

Sansa shook her head as they leaned back, side by side, on the vanity. “Then how….?”

“Well for one thing you looked like you’d been hit by a truck at dinner when Ned brought up Jaime.” Dany winked and nudged Sansa’s shoulder.

Sansa rolled her eyes. “I think I did pretty well considering how much I wanted to scream.”

“And then there’s the fact that when things started to turn bad for Baratheon and the Lannisters at Casterly Enterprises, I had Tyrion offer Jaime a job in Meereen with Khaleesi Apparel—a really handsome offer, if I do say so myself.” Dany bit her lip slyly, knowingly. “And Jaime politely turned it down, saying he was looking for work ‘ _in more northern areas’._ ” She leaned it conspiratorially. “Why? He suddenly has a love for hockey?……” She lifted a brow. “…..tobogganing?”

“Um….” Sansa began to laugh, not really knowing how, or if she wanted, to deny it.

“Look, I’m engaged to Jon Snow, so I feel I’m an expert on good guys,” Dany took Sansa’s hand and squeezed it. “……..and you need to hold on to that one. No matter what anyone else says.”

 

 

 

When she walked out the arrivals gate at Balerion Internatinal Airport in King’s Landing, she found Jaime standing there with a homemade sign in front of him that read: _Sansa, Sansa Stark._ She dropped her luggage and ran to him, letting out a breath she didn’t know she been holding when she felt him wrap her up tight in his arms, lifting her feet off the ground.

“ _Jaime_. Did you do that for me?” She pressed her face into his neck and smothered all the skin she could reach with large, smooching kisses. “Did you do that for me? Did you do _all of that_ for me?”

He laughed, running a soothing hand through her hair. “I think you’d be surprised the sheer, vast number of things I’d do for you—burn down cities, build them back up again.” He set her down and cupped her face in his hands, nodding encouragingly. “You do wanna go home again, to Winterfell, don’t you? I didn’t read that wrong?”

She nodded back, beginning to cry tears of joy. “I wanna go home. But it’s only home if it’s with you, I wasn’t lying when I said I’d go anywhere with you.” She bit her lip and lifted a brow. “But Jaime, is this what _you_ want? Will you be happy—?”

“Yes.” He stopped her worry dead in its tracks, smiling broadly. “I wanna do work I’m proud of, wanna sit around your family dinner table, I wanna take our kids to Reed Lake on Saturday morning.” He touched the snowflake pendant hanging off her neck. “I wanna see the snow fall all around you.

She gave a watery, genuine laugh. “Then let’s go home to Winterfell.”

 

 

 

Sansa shouldn’t have answered the call from the number that registered No Caller ID, but she was busy packing up her belongings to move out and wasn’t giving much thought to anything else.

Pure wickedness came over the phone line. “Well, well. If it isn’t the ginger-haired whore of the North.”

Sansa sighed deeply. “Something you want, Cersei?”

“You used to call me Mrs. Baratheon, back when you were pretending to be my daughter’s friend so that you could seduce the men in my family.” The venom from Cersei’s voice was practically oozing out of Sansa’s phone. “But I suppose you feel you’re on my same level now that you’ve ensnared my brother between your long legs.”

Sansa shook her head, mostly to herself. “No, I just used to have the _tiniest_ modicum of respect for you. And that’s long in the past.”

Cersei seethed, Sansa could just imagine her lips pulling back from her teeth. “I bet you feel happy, the way you and your family tried to take down mine.”

“I didn’t try to take down your family. Neither did _anyone else_ in my family.” Sansa stated the facts as how they happened—in every other world except for the delusional one that Cersei Lannister-Baratheon lived in. “And you’re so very beyond hypocritical, feeling self-righteous about it after what your family did to the Targaryens—and what you tried to do to mine.”

“So,” Cersei sighed haughtily. “my brother suddenly gets enamored of your cunt, and you suddenly get the smart mouth with me.” Cersei finished with a toothless warning. “You’d better watch what you say to me.”

“I’ll say whatever I want, but how ‘bout this for a smart mouth?” Sansa said evenly into the phone. “The life Jaime and I have with each other has nothing to do with you, Cersei. _Get the fuck over it_!”

And she threw the phone across the room, hitting the far wall.

Jaime suddenly came into the room with more empty boxes, lifting a concerned brow at seeing the discarded phone on the floor. “San? You okay.” He walked up to her and looked at her warily. “San, who just called?”

Sansa finally looked at him, smiling brightly, and surprisingly genuine. “ _Absolutely no one_. How would you feel about getting new phones when we get to Winterfell?”

 

 

 

Jaime and Sansa spent two days packing up their belongings from the apartment in King’s Landing, then got back on a plane to the North.

With hope in his heart, Jaime had contacted a realtor in Winterfell when she’d been gone, and had set up an appointment. And when they got to Winterfell, he left Sansa to tour houses, telling her he’d be happy with anything she chose. Before leaning in to whisper, “ _as long as it has a fireplace we can fuck in front of_.”

Then, he’d gotten in their rental car and made the short, yet utterly terrifying, drive to the Stark house.

Ned wasn’t terribly surprised when Jaime knocked on the door, but to say Catelyn was shocked to see him on her front porch, would be the understatement of the decade.

They let him in the house with warmth and welcome. That’s the Northern way, after all.

It actually went better than he’d thought. There was no throwing of objects at his head. No demands he ‘ _get the hell out’_. There was one slamming of the door, when Catelyn got too worked up and went out to the porch for a breath of air.

There was also one slight accusation of ‘ _taking advantage of my daughter_ ’ that Jaime liked to think he shut down quickly when he spoke straight from his heart:

 

“I didn’t take advantage of Sansa. I pity the fool who’d ever try. Your daughter’s a brilliant, talented, _adult_ woman. And I don’t know how I got so lucky that she chose me—but she did. She chose me. And because of that, I’m gonna do everything in my power and beyond that to be worthy of her. To make her happy, so that she and I can create a good life together.”

“I know you have doubts about some of my family members….. _I’ve_ always had doubts about them too. And when I met Sansa, those doubts became _certainties_. Now that I’ve experienced love with her, I see how truly _wrong_ I was loved by those people in the past. What I feel with Sansa—to be so completely accepted and supported—I can’t ever have anything less, and can’t ever let _her_ have anything less, either.”

“We’re going to live here in Winterfell, build a life here. We want you to be a part of it. I want your blessing, want it for Sansa’s sake. But even if I don’t receive it, it’ll never change what I feel.”

 

He walked off the front porch of the Stark house an hour later, with a handshake from Ned and a tentative smile and nod from Catelyn. It was a start.

 

 

 

As he was driving back, he got a call from Sansa, telling him an address he could put into his GPS. He arrived at an old, two-bedroom stone cottage in a cul-de-sac at the end of a road dotted with both houses and tiny retail shops. There was a large tree in the front yard and a red front door. In front of which, Sansa stood.

She bounced up and down on her toes, beaming at him as he got out of the car. “This is it. This is the one.”

He reached her, cupping the back of her neck and bringing her lips to his. “Then this is the one.”

“Don’t you wanna see inside?” She pulled back from the kiss.

“Don’t have to.” His eyes sparkled. “If you love it, I love it.”

A smile split her face that could have lit up a night sky. But then she looked down, biting her lip. “Um, how…….how did it go?”

“They didn’t murder me, so that’s a good sign.” He chuckled, running fingers through her loose hair that was blowing slightly in the wind. “It’ll take a while for them to get used to it. But eventually, it’ll be alright.”

She closed her eyes. “How do you know?”

“Because eventually they’ll see it, and they’ll know what we have is true.” He kissed her forehead. “Everyone will see it.”

She opened her eyes again to stare deep into his. “See what?”

He smiled softly and exhaled. “The part of you that lives in me.”

 

 

 

 

FOLLOW ON TO THE EPILOGUE…………….


	5. EPILOGUE-Wherever You Go, Whatever You Do

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A Big Wedding Day.
> 
> SUPER Big Thanks For Reading! Love You All!!!!!

She could barely breathe, and she was trying to keep it up on her end, she really was, but he was just _too good_.

Luckily his cock had been in her mouth long enough for it to be slicked up, and she worked him with her hand instead, stroking him long and slow—just the way he liked. But returning the favor he was currently doing for her—at least with her mouth—was just not happening.

She rested her cheek against his thigh and writhed her body on top of his, continuing her stroking. But he was killing her with that mouth of his. “Oh _GODS_ , Jaime. _Yes_.” She tried for another deep breath. “You are so good to me. _Fuck_.”

He only let up from his _fucking perfect_ tongue licking deep inside her and running swift and soft around her pussy, long enough to moan, “ _Fucking, gods_. You taste so good. I could do this forever.”

Her stroking faltered as she moaned lowly and her head dropped to the bed, gasping and shaking. “Baby, you’re _too good_. I’m sorry I can’t give you what you want.”

“ _I want_ my tongue in your fucking delicious cunt.” He reached up to give her ass a gentle slap. “That’s what _I’ve got, baby_. Just let go and enjoy it.”

Her legs shook and spasmed, her arms reached out as her fingers gripped the sheets, and her mind floated up to stare down at them, clutched together in delectable, wonderful sin. She came with a full-body wave of bliss. “Oh, _gods, gods_.”

Her whole body went loose, and he rolled out from under her, both still lying sideways on the bed as their heavy breaths subsided. He kissed her calf and his hands ran along her feet, thumbs massaging into her arches. “You’re going to wear high-heels for most of the day. Your feet will be killing you by the time we get home.”

She looked up, staring at him from the opposite side of the bed and smiling dazedly. “After what you just did to me? I could walk on spikes the rest of the day and still I’d feel like I was walking on clouds.” She pulled her legs up under her and turned, crawling up his body and grinning lustfully as she took his hard cock in her hand again. “You’re still not taken care of, what do you say we—"

Suddenly, _Here Comes the Bride_ began to ring out into the desire-filled haze of the room, and Sansa whimpered as she looked to her phone on the nightstand.

His hand reached up to fondle a breast. “Don’t you dare answer that phone, Sansa Stark.”

“Baby, I have to.” Sansa sighed, beginning to climb off him toward her nightstand. “That’s Margaery’s ringtone. I swore I’d pick up on the first ring and do whatever she needs today.” She picked up the phone, but came back to lean over him and give his lips and upside-down kiss. “I’m her maid of honor.”

Jaime let out a _loud_ , long groan, filling the room as he ran his hands over his face. And then a pounding began to boom through the wall from the next room, startling him and Sansa.

“ _Eww_ www………” A voice shouted out. “………. _is that a SEX groan?....GROSS_!”

Jaime sighed and put his head back on the pillow, a begrudging smile tugging on his lips, “Myrcella, DARLING?!! Why don’t you and your husband go out for a walk to explore the lovely streets of Winterfell this fine morning?!”

“ _Yeah, right_.” She yelled back with a huff. “ _At nine-months pregnant, I don’t walk, I waddle_.” There was one more pound against the wall. “ _But nice try wanting me out of the house so you can have loud sex with my best friend!”_

Sansa giggled at the scene from the nearby bathroom, naked as the day she was born, and hung up with Margaery, walking back to sit on the side of the bed next to him. “All the wedding stuff will be over tomorrow, and as much as I love our houseguests, it’ll be nice to have the house back to ourselves.”

“Crisis?” Jaime quirked a brow as he looked to her phone back on the table, his fingers running down her bare arm.

“I’m sure to a woman on her wedding day, it seemed like a crisis.” Sansa giggled, taking Jaime’s hand in hers. “She just needs ‘ _less pearly but still pale’_ fingernail polish.”

They remained on the bed, him laying down, her reclining slightly. Both tracing gentle fingers over each other’s bodies. He took her hand and kissed her palm. “Apparently, Myrcella is less than thrilled about hearing any evidence of our carnal activities.”

“Well,” she looked down at his still-hard cock. “the noise of the shower might help drown out some sound……….” she winked and began dragging him off the bed. “whadya think?”

He let himself be dragged and pulled her against his chest as they walked into the bathroom. “I think I love you for your mind as well as your body.”

 

 

 

Myrcella and Trystane rode with Jaime and Sansa to the wedding, both women trying not to wrinkle their bridesmaid’s dresses. And in the driver’s seat, Jaime nearly undid his bowtie in agitation of what Myrcella was telling him.

“They seriously stopped payment on his tuition check?” Sansa’s mouth dropped open.

“Well, Tommen basically told Mom, Dad, and Grandpa that he wanted nothing to do with them,” Myrcella exhaled loudly. “what did we expect them to do?”

“Care about their son’s education?” Trystane interjected in disgust.

Jaime laughed humorlessly. “Oh Trystane, I sometimes forget you’ve only known them for a short time.”

“Tommen once told me he’s wanted to go to the Academy of Braavos since he was seven-years-old!” Sansa huffed. “And now he just _can’t go_ because they _won’t pay_!”

“What about financial aid?” Trystane inquired, putting a soothing hand on Myrcella’s belly.

Jaime looked back through the rear-view mirror. “Even if he showed up at the Academy’s front door in threadbare clothes with holes in his shoes, they still wouldn’t offer _Tommen Lannister Baratheon_ need-based financial aid.”

“He’s a smart kid,” Sansa hoped with a small smile. “maybe next year he could qualify for merit-based aid.”

“Well, that doesn’t take care of this year, $75,000.” Myrcella frowns deeply. “And him getting a text saying if they don’t get it by next week, he’s un-enrolled.”

“We could cover this year.” Jaime looked to Sansa, and received her nod in return.

“With you in a new job, just having bought the house, and Sansa not working as she writes her book?” Tyrstane lifted a brow.

“We could ask my parents.” Sansa affirmed.

“If the money should come from anybody, it should come from _my_ family.” Trystane spoke up. “We all love Tommen.”

“They just gave you money to start your business.” Jaime disagreed adamantly. “And you’re in the same boat as us with a new house and ‘Cella not working to be with the baby.”

Sansa put a hand on Jaime’s forearm across the console, then looked back to Myrcella and Trystane with a soft smile. “We’ll all chip in, we’ll all work together, and the tuition will get covered.”

They pulled up to the ceremony tent, with hundreds of other guests mulling about. The four of them got out of the car, Jaime gingerly helping Myrcella out of her back seat and shutting the car door for her. Her phone began to ring in her purse.

“It’s Tommen.” She looked down at the phone, then pointed to a quiet space nearby. “I gotta take it.”

Jaime smiled slightly. “Tell him everyone says _Hi_.”

They found Arya and Gendry, Jon and Daenerys, Meera and Bran, Tyrion and Shae, and Loras, Garlan, and Willas Tyrell, all standing in a group by a weirwood tree. All laughing and happy for the big day.

After a couple of minutes, Myrcella ran up to them nearly bouncing on her feet in excitement and joy. Trystane tried to stop her immediately, “Babe, you shouldn’t be bouncing like that.”

“It’s paid!” She squealed, clasping her hands happily. “And not just this year, but all four years tuition has been paid! Tommen got a phone call from the Academy. He’s enrolled and expected there in three weeks.”

Sansa was nearly breathless with joy, looking at Jaime who was just as flabbergasted. “How?”

Myrcella beamed, looking around to everyone’s happy faces. “Tommen asked the Academy and they said the money was wired from an account.......” her eyes then settled on Tyrion, smiled gratefully. “….. in Meereen.”

Jaime chuckled, looking at his brother. “Tyrion…… you sly bastard.”

“Uncle Tyrion……” Myrcella spoke through happy tears. “I can’t believe……..”

But Tyrion held up his hands, shaking his head. “As much as I’d love to take credit, dear niece—"

Jon spoke up, shaking his head. “No. It’s wasn’t Tyrion, it was—”

He was stopped when Daenerys shushed him harshly and smacked his arm, a guilty look mixed with a true smile on her face.

All stopped dead, staring at Daenerys with their mouths hanging open. Myrcella was the first to speak. “Dany……did you…..did you……?”

Daenerys rolled her eyes and shuffled her feet before exhaling, “Tyrion told me…….Fuck!” She stopped her shuffling and stood firm, hands on her hips. “Call it ‘ _paying it forward’_ …….a Stark paid for a Targaryen to go to school. So now a Targaryen pays for a Baratheon to go.”

“Daenerys…..” Jaime gulped audibly. “That’s……that’s……

“Wow.” Gendry piped up.

Jon kissed Dany’s temple and pulled her into his side. Her fists clenched at her side and her violet eyes twinkled with determination. “I did it. It’s done. Ned Stark asked nothing in return. I’m the same. Let’s never talk of it again.” She looked around to all congregated with dragon-fire in her stare. “Understood?”

 

 

They had all begun to walk toward the ceremony tent, Jaime taking Sansa’s hand, when they heard, “Psst! Hey, you guys.”

They both turned to see Arya hanging back from the crowd, she waved to them. “Come here.”

Sansa and Jaime walked to where Arya stood, and she pulled something out of her bag. It was a small satin purse. She ducked her head conspiratorially, silently making them do the same, and pulled out two white gold rings—one smaller than the other. The wedding rings Robb and Margaery had asked Arya to make in her and Gendry’s metal shop.

“Whadya think?” Arya asked nervously, biting her lip.

They were two exceptionally beautiful rings. So, Sansa said as much. With Jaime agreeing whole-heartedly.

“I was really freaking out about it.” Arya exhaled anxiously. “I wanted them to be beautiful.”

“You’ve smithed more complicated objects than two rings, Arya.” Jaime chuckled, patting Arya’s arm. “Besides, everything you make is beautiful.”

Arya’s eyes widened in surprise and a bright grin grew on her now-relieved face. “Thanks.”

Sansa and Jaime began to walk toward the tent again, still holding hands.

“Hey, Lannister?!” Arya yelled again. Once again, Jaime and Sansa turned. Arya shrugged. “You know……you’re alright.”

Jaime nodded in thanks, and walked away with Sansa, grinning brightly, “Apparently…. _I’m alright_.”

“I’d tell you not to get a big head about it,” Sansa chuckled, holding onto his arm. “but it’s better than 99% of the stuff she says to me.”

 

 

Once inside, Jaime was left alone as Sansa joined the bridal party and he heard his named called out through the throng of guests. “JAIME!”

He looked over and smiled when he saw who the voice belonged to. Walking over, he kissed her on the cheek. “Cat, you look lovely as always.”

Catelyn accepted the kiss with a corresponding smile and playfully swatted him on the arm. “Oh, you flatterer!”

He looked around at the tent, loaded with flowers in every corner, wall and aisle; opulent silk-covered chairs; literally over a thousand candles in gilded scones; and a twelve-piece orchestra wafting classical music into the air. He gave a tight smile. “Everything looks……wonderful.”

“It’s a bit much.” She cringed as she laughed. “But that’s the Highgarden Tyrells for you. Once Alerie got together with the wedding planner, any chance this wedding had of not being over-the-top flew out the window.”

“It doesn’t matter.” He patted her shoulder. “At the end of the day, Robb and Margaery will be married and _that’s_ all that matters.”

“Well, I guess a ceremony and reception this grand will make up for the fact none of us were even _there_ when Dany and Jon slinked off to Lys for a quickie wedding.”

He looked around at the grandeur again. “This does all seem like two-times the wedding.” He shrugged and they both laughed.

“Jaime, I’ll see you after.” She kissed his cheek again. “Have to go get ‘ _into position’_ for the start of the ceremony.”

As she walked away, he said, “Save me a dance!”

 

 

The ceremony was beautiful, but not because of the opulence that surrounded them. Margaery cried when Robb put the ring on her finger and Robb stuttered over his vows, so nervous, but also so choked up with joy.

Daenerys, Arya, Shae, and even heavily pregnant Myrcella, all looked beautiful in their bridesmaid’s dresses. But Maid of Honor Sansa looked the most beautiful of all. Not just because of the happiness for her brother and best friend shining through in her ever-present smile, but because her position beside the bride put her right next to a glowing candelabra—the candlelight brightening her ivory skin, making her copper hair shimmer, and reflecting off her glistening blue eyes.

He couldn’t believe he got to go home with her.

 

Once again, Sansa stood in her bridesmaid’s gown, holding her flower bouquet, looking down the receiving line at the truly and deliriously happy bride and groom.

But this time, when Jaime came up behind her, making her insides shiver as he spoke, she could turn and wrap her arms around his neck. She could kiss his lips. And later, she could twirl around the dance floor, not wishing she could be held by someone else—because all she’d ever want was already holding her in his arms.

The band leader took the microphone and shouted over the drumroll. “Ladies and Gentleman! For the first time ever as a married couple, Robb Stark and Maragery Tyrell-Stark!”

Robb and Maragery entered the reception hall to clapping, hoots, and hollers; their hands clasped and held high, and big, dumb, elated smiles on their faces.

Jaime and Sansa shouted happily out onto the dance floor as Robb and Margaery took their places in the middle. “Wooo. Yay! Way to go!”

But it all died down when the song started.

 

**_Oh, today I’m just a drop of water_ **

**_And I’m running down a mountainside_ **

**_Come tomorrow I’ll be in the ocean_ **

**_I’ll be rising with the morning tide_ **

After the first chorus, when Ned and Catelyn and Alerie and Mace, joined the happy couple out onto the floor, Sansa felt a gentle hand on her elbow.

Jaime’s smile was brilliant. “Dance with me, Maid of Honor?’’

Sansa laughed and put her hand in his. “Abso-fucking-lutely.”

**_I’m an atom in a sea of nothing_ **

**_Looking for another to combine_ **

**_Maybe we could be the start of something_ **

**_Be together at the start of time_ **

****

“Very happy day.” She beamed up at him.

“Yes.” He ran a gentle thumb over the apple of her cheek. “Most of my days have been happy since I found you.”

She kissed him.

**_When you walked into the room just then_ **

**_It’s like the sun came out_ **

**_And the day is clear_ **

**_My voice is just a whisper_ **

**_Louder than the screams you hear_ **

He swung her around, making her dizzy. “Are you happy?”

Her fingers stroked the back of his neck. “Deliriously so.”

“Good.” He thought of the diamond ring, hidden back home in the bottom drawer of his dresser. “Hey, Sansa, Sansa Stark?”

“Yes, Jaime, Jaime Lannister?” She grinned, lighting up her already glowing face.

He took a hopeful breath. “I have a question to ask you…………..”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Richard Marx-Right Here Waiting, title of fic and all chapter titles.
> 
> Gabrielle Aplin-Start of Time, wedding dance.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos are always appreciated!


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